


A Miserable Chord

by ThirdGenerationRockette



Category: The Newsroom (US TV)
Genre: AU, Angst, F/M, Misery AU, Pre-Series, Will/Mac 1.0
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-08
Updated: 2018-02-08
Packaged: 2019-03-15 14:13:50
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 10
Words: 31,030
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13615053
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ThirdGenerationRockette/pseuds/ThirdGenerationRockette
Summary: She doesn't sleep, and at 4:30 she gives up trying. There are no messages from Will, and she toys with calling him, her finger hovering over his name on the screen before she decides against it and makes coffee instead. It seems to take her forever to shower, dress, dry her hair, and the whole time she feels like she's wading through treacle, her mind constantly replaying the night before, recalling his coldness, his hurt, his refusal to let her stay and explain any further.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Title comes from _Every Hair Knows Your Name_ by Jens Lekman.

"So, I kind of realised something today..." She pauses and he looks up from the crossword he's partway through, a raised eyebrow telling her she should continue. "I mean, it's probably nothing, and so completely unlikely to be what I'm thinking it could be, but I'm usually pretty regular, and, well, I'm...I'm late, six days late, which I suppose isn't actually all _that_ much, but it's enough that-"

"Mac." He cuts in, shutting down her babble, her mind spinning suddenly. "Are you saying...your period is six days late, is that what you're telling me?"

"Yeah," she says, biting her lip, trying to gauge the look on his face. "I know we haven't really ever talked about kids, not properly, I mean, not yet, and really only in the abstract, but I...I bought a test, it's better to know either way, right?"

"Definitely," he says, and his face softens into a smile, relief blooming in her chest as she lets out a sigh. "If you _are_ pregnant, then...well, we should do all the things we've been talking about already and haven't gotten to. Move in together properly, get married-"

"Get married?" She can't help the smile that creeps onto her lips, his old fashioned attitude sweet rather than annoying.

"Yes, Mackenzie, _married_." He nods, shrugging slightly. "You know I love you, surely hearing that I figure we'll get married at some point can't be that much of a surprise to you?"

"No, I mean, yes, of course I know you love me, and..." She pauses, the secret she's been keeping for almost two years pushing itself forward suddenly, catching in her throat. Sitting forward, she grabs his hands. "You know I love you too, right? I _love_ you, Billy."

"I know," he says, an amused look in his eyes as she grips his hands a little tighter. "Honey, I know."

"Okay, good, because I'm going to tell you something, and God, it's so irrelevant now, it was so long ago..." She swallows hard, suddenly nervous, aware that she's potentially making a far bigger deal of this than she needs to, but needing now to be completely honest with him. "I don't even know why I'm telling you, other than if there's a possibility we're going to have a baby, maybe get married, then I don't want any secrets between us."

He folds the newspaper, leans forward to put it on the table, before turning back to her, all traces of amusement gone from his eyes, replaced with something she doesn't recognise; suspicion, perhaps. Concern, definitely.

"When we were first dating, you know I'd just broken up with Brian, and for a long time it hadn't been good, but it was also...he had some kind of hold over me, I think, a control, which I really didn't acknowledge at the time, or for a long time after, but..." She feels sick, her stomach flips over, and she wonders if she should just stop, should tell him it's nothing, it doesn't matter. But everything within her is screaming that if things are going to be permanent then she needs to be honest, so she takes a deep breath and goes on. "You and I starting dating, and I guess he heard on the grapevine that I was seeing you, and he started calling again. Funny how someone wants you when they know somebody else does too. Anyway, it was a handful of times, I swear, and it was a mistake, a huge, awful, really _stupid_ mistake, and when I realised I was in love with you, from the very moment you put those socks on my feet and I knew without a doubt I was in love with you, I never saw him again, I-"

"Wait, you've been running back to Brian? Brian Brenner, you've been... _sleeping_ with him?" He stands up suddenly, running his hands through his hair, his agitation clear.

"No, no, I'm not! It's not..." A wave of panic washes over her as she starts to sense his anger, his hurt, and his complete inability to grasp that she's not talking about something that happened recently. "It was such a long time ago, you and I had only just started dating and I-"

"Are you only telling me because you're not sure whose baby this is?" He glares at her, the coldness in his eyes catching her totally off guard. "Is that what this is?"

"Will, listen to me." She reaches for his hands, wrapping her arms around herself instead when he pulls roughly away from her. "I haven't seen Brian in almost two years, since the day I knew I was in love with you. I love _you_ , I'm sorry, I'm so, so sorry, I've regretted it every day since, and I- "

"Take the test, find out if there is a baby or not, and we'll figure things out from there." He turns, refusing to look at her and she feels her eyes start to fill with frustrated tears, because he won't listen, he's not hearing what she's saying at all.

"Will, please, I'll take it now, but I need to know what that means, 'we'll figure things out'?" She can hear the pleading in her voice and she hates it, but she also hates the coldness she hears in his.

"It means I need some time to think, Mackenzie, alright?" Finally he turns back to face her and she swipes at the tears rolling slowly down her cheeks before she meets his eyes. "Take the test."

She nods, looking around her, confused momentarily, unable to remember where her bag is, where she left it, eventually spotting it on the dining room table and moving quickly to grab it. Stopping in front of him again, she silently begs him to look at her, to just show some sign that what she's telling him is sinking in, but his gaze stays fixed on the floor so she sighs and heads for the bathroom.

Her hands shake as she rips open the test, and she has to force herself to take a few long, slow breaths before she can make it to sit down on the toilet seat. Twenty minutes ago she had started to think that sure, a baby wasn't exactly in her plans for right now, but that if she was pregnant with Will's baby, timing could go fuck itself. Now she doesn't know what she wants, she doesn't know what he's thinking, and she can't imagine having his baby but not having _him_. She finishes, sets the test down beside the sink, and washes her hands before turning around, unable to stand to look at herself in the mirror. Instead she focuses on her watch, watching as the seconds pass infinitely slowly, until it's time to turn the test over and face the tiny display that could potentially change everything.

"It's not, I'm not...it's negative." She walks back into the living room where he's standing in the exact spot she left him, and it hurts that he wasn't even curious enough to inch just a tiny bit in the direction of the bathroom.

"Definitely?" he asks, his eyes narrowing as he turns to look at her, his hands firmly on his hips.

"I'm not pregnant, Billy," she says, scared now of what comes next, wishing she hadn't told him about Brian but knowing she had to. "So, what...what now?"

"I'll call you a cab," he says, picking his phone up off the table, flinching when she grabs his arm, shaking his head. "You need to go home tonight, Mac. I need to think, and I can't do that with you here. Go home, I'll see you at work in the morning."

"Don't do this, not now." She keeps her hand on his wrist, stopping him from dialing, scared that if he sends her away tonight he might never let her back in. "Let's figure this out tonight, please, I just want to-"

"You know what, hon? Right now, I don't care what you want, I just..." He pauses and pulls his arm from her grasp, his eyes burning into hers with a pure, hot anger. "I need you to leave."

He starts to dial and she knows this is it, there's no changing his mind at this point, for the first time in over a week, she's going home to her own apartment tonight. She picks up her bag and listens as he asks for a cab as quickly as possible, giving his address and hanging up.

"How would you have felt if I had been pregnant?" She bites her lip, unsure why she's asking, quite sure she won't get an honest answer from him, certainly not right now.

"You're not, so it doesn't matter," he says quickly, with no hint of warmth.

"I know I'm not." She sighs, rubbing a hand across her forehead, a slow ache building behind her eyes. "I just-"

"Are you sure you weren't just making it up to soften the blow of telling me about Brian?" He almost spits the question at her, so much that she recoils from the cruelty of it.

"I'm sure," she says, angry now at his accusation. She knows he's hurt, but it doesn't mean he can talk to her like she's someone he barely knows. "I'd never do something like that, and you fucking know it."

"Cab's on the way, it'll be here in five minutes," he says, his voice low, defeated. "I'm going to bed."

"Don't do this, I need to stay, we need to talk," she says, trying one final time to break through to him. "I was a long time ago, I love you, this doesn't change that, it doesn't have to change anything."

"It changes _everything_." He turns and strides from the room, leaving her standing alone, wishing she could turn back time and erase the last awful hour.

*

She doesn't sleep, and at 4:30 she gives up trying. There are no messages from Will, and she toys with calling him, her finger hovering over his name on the screen before she decides against it and makes coffee instead. It seems to take her forever to shower, dress, dry her hair, and the whole time she feels like she's wading through treacle, her mind constantly replaying the night before, recalling his coldness, his hurt, his refusal to let her stay and explain any further. She finds herself in a cab she has no recollection of hailing, on her way to work with no idea what she can expect from Will, and she's scared. Not of him, never of him. She's scared because she can't take back what she told him last night, and if she can't convince him it meant nothing, that it was a horrible mistake and that it's long over, then she doesn't know what that means for them and their future.

He isn't there when she arrives, and after the third person asks her if she's feeling okay, she wonders how bad she looks. She lies, of course, says she's fine, a bit tired maybe, but fine. Inside though her stomach churns, there's a heavy weight of anxiety pinning her down, and she has to concentrate just to keep her hands from shaking. The longer Will fails to appear at the office, the worse she feels. The morning passes and still no sign, and she all but stumbles through the first pitch meeting, managing to cobble together a passable running order while glancing at the door every few minutes. She sends him a message, in the same style of all her messages to him; sweet, slightly teasing, ending with a kiss, always ending with a kiss. When nothing comes back in half an hour, or an hour, she changes tack and sends a message asking him to please confirm he'll be at work for tonight's show, still ending with her customary kiss.

_'I'll be there by four.'_

Short, abrupt, no kiss in return, nothing suggesting he's messaging anyone other than a colleague checking up on him. She isn't naive enough to think he was going to wake up and all would be fine again, but her heart sinks, overwhelmed by the feeling, the real sense that he isn't going to want to talk this through at all. He arrives almost exactly when he said he would, walking into the meeting room two minutes before four, looking as weary as she does, the need for TV make-up stronger than ever. She smiles at him and he looks away, refusing to make eye contact except to agree or disagree on various things in the running order, and when the meeting ends he's up, out of his chair and out of the room before she's even gathered her papers from the table.

He's behind his desk, his eyes fixed determinedly on his screen even as she shuts the door and moves to stand in front of him. If she has to, she'll stand here until air time, she needs him to talk to her, she needs to make him listen, she can't let this ruin everything, she just _can't_. He lets out a long sigh and finally looks up at her.

"If you're here about switching the B and C blocks, then you're wasting your time, Mac," he says, his tone purely business. "It works fine as it is, it's-"

"I don't care about that," she says, exasperated by his ability to apparently totally shut her out, his refusal to face things. "I mean, I do, obviously, but that's not why I'm here right now, and you know it. We need to talk about last night, Will."

"What is there to say?" His eyes bore deep into hers, the blue so cold she feels almost chilled, and she can't bring herself to answer. "I didn't sleep last night, I kept thinking about you, about what you did, and I can't...I love you, Mackenzie, I do, and I can't just turn that off, but I don't know if I can trust you anymore, and that's a problem for me. It's a real fucking problem."

"You can trust me, you can. I love you, I _only_ love you." She clasps her hands together, cracking her knuckles in an attempt to stem the rising swell of panic she's feeling. "It's not an excuse, but my relationship with Brian was...not particularly healthy. He was controlling and manipulative, and for a tiny, stupid moment, I let him call the shots again but it’s long, long over, I promise. You're the only one I want, Will. When I picture my life five, ten, twenty years from now, it's you I picture it with. I don't...I don't know what else to say."

"I think we should take some time apart, we need space," he says, holding up his hand when she starts to respond. " _I_ need space, Mac. I can't be around you right now."

"Please don't do this, Will." She hears her own voice, begging, willing to do whatever it takes to change his mind. "It's Friday, we can spend the weekend talking, working this out, whatever you need, just...please don't end things over this, over-"

"I'm not...I'm not exactly ending it, but surely you can see why there isn't a chance in hell I can spend this weekend with you?" It's not a question he expects her to answer, and she hopes the pleading in her eyes will get through to him. "I just think, right now, some space is what we need. I need to wrap my brain around this, and maybe time apart will help you to decide what you want, who you want-"

"There's no decision to be made, I know who I want. I want _you_. Just you." The room suddenly feels like it's closing in, and she fears this is it, that they're over. "Please don't do this, can we just-"

"We have a show to do." He cuts her off, turning back to his screen, signalling that, as far as he's concerned, the conversation is over. "Anything else?"

She can't find any words, and the lump in her throat threatens to overwhelm her, so she shakes her head, straightens her shoulders and heads for the door.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _Her things are everywhere. Her yoghurts are stacked in his fridge, her tea in his cupboard, her make-up in the bathroom cabinet, and her clothes still hang in her half of his closet. He's not sure when it became her half, it just happened, pretty gradually he guesses, starting with a shirt or two, a skirt, a pair of shoes, and then before he realised it was happening, she was just here._

Her things are everywhere. Her yoghurts are stacked in his fridge, her tea in his cupboard, her make-up in the bathroom cabinet, and her clothes still hang in her half of his closet. He's not sure when it became her half, it just happened, pretty gradually he guesses, starting with a shirt or two, a skirt, a pair of shoes, and then before he realised it was happening, she was just here. Then one day he'd just stopped thinking of it as his place, and more as theirs, and he doesn't remember the last night he was here alone; a week ago, maybe more, he's not sure. They've fallen into a habit of heading back here together after the show each night without question, with an occasional Friday night at her place so she can throw some more stuff in a bag. He hates to admit it, but God, the place feels empty without her. His hand reaches for a black dress she has hanging up, his fingers running gently down the soft fabric, remembering how she looked the last time she wore it, how her hair had curled down over her shoulders, her eyes bright as they had stepped out into the cold. The memory hits him hard and he slams the closet door shut, knowing suddenly that he doesn't want to pack up her things, fuck it, he'll tell her she can come by when he's not here and collect them instead.

He spends Saturday itching to call her, he picks up his phone more than once, but he manages to resist, distracting himself with coffee, cigarettes, and when it no longer seems too early for it, whiskey. Realistically, this was inevitable, and better now than after he'd married her, and thankfully before there were kids in the picture, if that was something that was a possibility. He's not completely oblivious, he knows she loved him, but she's also not quite thirty-two, she's ambitious and smart, and so damn beautiful...yeah, he was probably kidding himself that it was ever going to end with her as his wife. Still, he wishes it didn't have to end with her running back to her asshole ex-boyfriend.

When he told her it wasn't over, that he just needed to think, he meant it, he hoped he could calm down, think more clearly, decide how to move past it, how to forgive her. Standing in the bedroom now, surrounded by her things, bathed in the faint scent she left behind, he's almost certain it's going to prove impossible. An impulse seizes him and he reaches for his phone.

"Will?" Charlie's familiar voice comes down the line, and the surprise in his tone sends a jolt of guilt through him, reminding him he doesn't call enough. "Didn't expect to hear from you on a Saturday night. Shouldn't CNN's hotshot be out on the town?"

"I'm sure CNN's hotshot _is_ out on the town, whoever he or she is," he says, pouring another glass and taking a gulp. "How are you, Charlie? How's Nancy?"

"She's good, we both are," Charlie says, the smile clear in his voice. "What about you? When are we going to meet this young lady of yours? I can't believe you've been keeping her hidden all this time, it's a fucking disgrace. We're in New York, it's hardly the end of the earth-"

"I know, I'm sorry, it's just...things are busy, you know how it is." He pauses and takes another mouthful of whiskey. "Listen, I was wondering...how are things looking at ACN right now? Are there any openings? In New York, I mean."

"Sure, who's it for?" Charlie asks, curious. "If it's someone you're recommending, we can work something out, no problem, I-"

"Me, Charlie." He stops him, needing to just get to the point. "Do you have anything for _me_?"

"Ah, I get it! The dream team has had its trial run at CNN and now you're ready to return to the mothership under the guidance of the finest of all leaders," Charlie says, excitement running through his voice. "That's me I'm talking about, if it wasn't clear. You know I'd love to have you here, Will, and Mackenzie too, the two of you are doing good things down there, you're-"

"It wouldn't be Mackenzie, just me." He cuts him off, unable to bear thinking about what a great proposition that would be, and that maybe if they'd been in New York all along rather than DC, the same city as her fucking ex, then maybe she wouldn't have strayed. "I'm asking if there's an opening for me, Charlie."

"You want to come back to ACN? Seriously?" Charlie falls silent, so he waits, knowing he isn't finished, he's just trying to make sense of what he's hearing. "Now...don't take this the wrong way, Will, you know I'd love to have you back in New York, but it seemed to me you were pretty settled in DC. You have something approaching a really good show right now, you have Mackenzie-"

"Look, Mackenzie and I are taking some time apart, a break, I guess, or whatever the fuck you want to call it, and I need..." He sighs, derailed briefly by the thought of her, the thought of not seeing her, not waking up next to her every day. "I need to get out of DC, so if you do have anything..."

"God dammit, Will, what happened?" Charlie asks, and he tries to ignore what sounds like disappointment in his voice.

"Nothing, it doesn't matter." There's no way he can bring himself to tell Charlie what happened, it's hard enough having it running through his head like an out of control truck. "Look, don't worry about it, I'll figure something out."

"Hey, I didn't say I _don't_ have anything for you." Charlie's voice softens, filling him with relief. "Can I work some things out and call you Monday morning?"

"Yeah, sure, Monday's great." He lets out a long sigh and reaches for his glass, draining the last of the whiskey from it. "Thanks, Charlie."

*

He wakes with the groggy feeling only a pill-induced sleep can bring, and he has to swallow past his dry throat several times before he can even manage to lift his head from the pillow. It's early, too fucking early, but he knows he's awake for the day now so he slowly sits up and moves to the edge of the bed. His eye lands on the dresser, his gaze fixing on the small bottle of perfume, almost empty, empty enough that he'd made a mental note just a couple of days earlier to pick up a new bottle to surprise her. Now though, he finds himself crossing the room, picking it up and moving into the bathroom to hurl it into the trash.

Despite vowing the night before not to pack up any of her things, the sight of them in the cold light of day changes his mind and he suddenly, urgently needs every trace of her out of his apartment. Pulling out a suitcase, he sets it on his bed and starts to fold her clothes into it. He watches as his favourite of her sweaters goes in (soft dark blue cashmere that makes her eyes dance when she wears it), followed by her shoes (the heels that flatter her already perfect legs), and the familiar pencil skirts she wears to the office (hugging her gentle curves). Last of all, he braves her drawer, scooping her underwear up in one huge handful and tossing it in amongst the clothes. Once the majority is done, his mind feels clearer, he doesn't feel like she's still there, subliminally trying to convince him she's sorry, desperately attempting to persuade him to forgive her. He makes coffee and as he sits staring blankly at the kitchen counter, he decides he needs to go right now, he needs to return her things and maybe then he may be able to think, to begin to process everything, to consider if there could still be a chance he can move past this and let her back in. For now though, he needs some space, just like he told her.

His resolve weakens when she opens the door and he sees the unmistakable glimmer of hope in her eyes, offset by anxiety as she pulls her bottom lip between her teeth. He watches as the hope flares and dies the instant she sees the suitcase in his hand and the expression on his face, clearly not one that suggests he's ready to take back his assertions about needing time apart.

"Are those..." She starts to speak but her eyes fill with tears and she stops, shaking her head and opening the door a little wider to allow him through.

"Yeah, your things." He nods and steps inside, moving the suitcase into the hallway and waiting for her to turn to him. "I figured it made sense for me to bring them over today, you know..."

"Because you can't even bear the thought of me setting foot back inside your apartment?" She swipes at her face, angry with herself, he thinks, at her obvious emotion.

"No, I just..." He stops because he can't deny it, he was struggling enough just having her things in his apartment that no, he really doesn't think he could handle her presence there. Not right now.

"Is there any point in telling you again how sorry I am?" she asks, and he's suddenly mesmerised by her hands, her fingers clasped tightly together, her knuckles white. "Because I really _am_ sorry, I love you-"

"Stop, Mackenzie, please," he says quickly, suddenly unable to stand and listen to her pleading again, just like she had the night before.

"I don't...last night you said you needed some space, you think we should take some time, but twelve hours later you're here with my things in a fucking suitcase, like this is...final." She stops and he sees in her eyes how confused she is, and he can see pure exhaustion too, the evidence of a sleepless night all too clear. "I don't know what this is, I don't understand what I'm meant to do now."

"I don't know what this is either." He feels his shoulders drop in defeat, because he understands what she's asking but he can't give her the definite answer she needs. "All I'm certain about right now is that I can't look at you without thinking of you with _him_ , and I need to know if some time apart will change that."

"There's nothing I can do to change your mind, is there?" Her defeated tone matches his and when he shakes his head he sees her bottom lip start to tremble, and she wraps her arms tightly around herself in an attempt to regain control. "What about work? How are we going to-"

"Work's work, Mac, we'll do whatever we have to do," he says, shrugging in his own attempt to stay strong, deciding to say nothing about his conversation with Charlie, not until he has something to tell.

"Okay." Her voice is barely a whisper as she nods and gives him a last, lingering look. "I guess I'll see you at the office."  
Something inside his chest uncurls and takes over his brain, and without thinking it through any further, he takes a step forward and slides his hand into her hair, cupping her chin and ignoring the stunned gasp she lets out, her eyes wide and questioning as she looks up at him.

"Will?" Her voice shakes and his thumb strokes softly across her face.

"I thought..." He leans in and kisses her; a hard, fast kiss, more of a taste than real contact, but when he pulls back her eyes are brimming with tears and it feels like a knife to the gut. "I thought you were it, Mackenzie. I really did."

He doesn't know if she's about to respond, but he doesn't give her a chance, turning and heading down her hallway, slamming the door behind him and walking away without a single glance back.

*

On Sunday he decides to go for a walk, and he keeps walking, stopping briefly to pick up a coffee, but mostly just walking. When he woke up, his apartment felt like such a contradictory combination of empty and claustrophobic that he couldn't breathe until he was outside, until he was blocks away, forcing the memories of sleepy Sunday mornings with Mackenzie as far into the back of his mind as possible. Angry all over again, he wonders why the fuck she did it, what the hell was lacking in him that made cheating so tempting, and right now he really wishes she hadn't told him at all. His phone rings suddenly, startling him, and he reaches for his pocket, hoping it's not her, hoping it _is_.

"Charlie?" He's surprised, he can't hide it, and he has no idea if a call so quickly is a good or a bad thing. "Didn't expect to hear from you so soon."

"I know, but I was thinking about your call...and I need to know if you're serious, Will, if a move to New York, back to ACN, is what you really want," Charlie says, firmly. "Look, I don't know what's going on with you and Mackenzie, but I do know she made you happy, and it's obvious from the show that you work well together. I wouldn't want to offer you something if this was a whim, a reaction to a fight, a spat-"

"I'm serious. Deadly serious." He says quickly, hoping Charlie can hear the certainty in his tone.

"Alright." One word, followed by several long seconds of silence before Charlie sighs and speaks again. "I need to know what your situation is at CNN in terms of your contract, how long they have you locked in, how the fuck much we might have to pay to get you out of it. Can you send something over to me so I can have the lawyers take a look first thing tomorrow?"

"Yeah, no problem..." His mind starts to whir as he tries not to jump to conclusions, but he's known Charlie for a long time, he can read his tone pretty well. "Wait, does that mean...are you saying you have something?"

"That's exactly what I'm saying," Charlie says, the smile in his voice clear. "If you want to come back to New York, then yeah, I have something."


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _End of the week, three days from now he's leaving for New York, and that feels much more permanent than just 'taking a break'. Not lessened by the fact that he didn't even tell her himself, that she had to hear it from the news director who, understandably, thought she already knew, her blank look and stunned silence disproving that theory almost instantly._

She isn't sure how long she's been standing there before she realises she hasn't pressed any of the buttons, that instead she's been staring blankly at the elevator door, the words "end of the week" ringing in her ears. End of the week, three days from now he's leaving for New York, and that feels much more permanent than just 'taking a break'. Not lessened by the fact that he didn't even tell her himself, that she had to hear it from the news director who, understandably, thought she already knew, her blank look and stunned silence disproving that theory almost instantly.

When she gets back downstairs, his office door is closed but she doesn't care, she needs to look him in the eye and try to understand what he's thinking, why he's making a move so drastic when mere days ago he insisted he just needed some space, some time to think. Pushing the door open, she makes sure to close it behind her, and she sees the wary look on his face the instant he looks up at her.

"Were you even going to tell me at all?" She tucks her hair behind her ear and watches as he taps a pen absently on the desk. "Or was I going to come in next Monday to find someone else sitting in here and a post-it note from you on my monitor?"

"I was going to tell you...I almost did yesterday, but then, well, I didn't, I guess." He shrugs and at least has the good grace to look somewhat uncomfortable.

"So this means...I'm not an idiot, and this is starting to feel like more than just some space, right? I mean, I'll be in DC, you'll be in New York, it's been four days and you've already decided that leaving town is your only option. Is this..." She pauses, swallows hard, watching as his eyes dart away, avoiding hers as she speaks. "Is this it, Billy? Is there no hope for us? As far as you're concerned, are we...over?"

"That's not what I'm saying, I...I just know that right now, being in New York feels right for me, for a while anyway. It'll be easier for both of us. You can stay in Washington, carry on with a new anchor. I've worked for ACN before, for Charlie, it's just..." He stops and finally meets her gaze, and the sadness in his eyes confuses her, so at odds with his firm tone. "I'm not saying there's no chance we can work this out, but...I don't know."

"Do you know what they said to me upstairs?" At his raised eyebrows, she carries on. "That at first they thought it was a ploy, that the two of us had cooked up the idea to see what they might offer us. I think they realised pretty quickly I had no fucking idea what was happening, and I wish...I know I probably don't have any right to expect anything from you right now, but I just wish I'd heard it from you."

"I know, I..." He sighs, runs a nervous hand through his hair. "You'll stay though, right? The show's good, Mac, and while you're running it, it can be good with another anchor too."

"It's not a case of just giving me another anchor to work with and the show will just sail right along. Sometimes the reason something's good is because the combination is right," she says, pausing because she isn't entirely sure what she wants to say, other than to beg him to stay, which is definitely not what she's going to do. "The show works because it's _us_ , Will, because you make me a better producer, and I bring out the best in you on screen. But yeah, I'll stay, for now at least, deal with whoever they bring in. I don't know what else I can do."

"I should have told you, you shouldn't have heard it from upstairs," he says, his words stopping her as she reaches the door, and it's the closest she'll get to an apology.

"Would it be...easier if _I_ left?" She turns back, biting her lip, thinking that if she leaves the network then maybe he'll stay, and if they're in the same city there's a chance this really can be just a break, not the end she fears it's about to become. "I'd stay in DC, and so could you. I get that you don't feel we can work together right now, but New York, Will, it's so-"

"It's a done deal, Mac. I'm flying up Saturday, I'll be on the air for ACN Monday," he says, sighing slowly. "Friday's my last show here."

She knows he has nothing more to add, and that there's nothing else she can say. He's stubborn, determined, and when his mind is made up there's very little that can change it, not even her, and certainly not now. She loves him, and he still loves her, she knows that, but he's angry with her, he's hurt, and she has a feeling that if there was switch inside his brain to control love, he'd have flipped it to off by the time she left his apartment on Thursday night. Nodding and swallowing the lump rising up into her throat, she turns and walks back out.

The next few days feel endless, and she can't stand to be in a room with him for any longer than she has to be, because it only reminds her that he's about to leave and she doesn't know when, or even _if_ she'll see him again. On Friday she wakes up feeling sick, and the thought of this being his last day in DC, combined with the pain of knowing she brought this all on herself, is almost too much. From the minute she arrives at the office, she throws herself into the tiniest details of tonight's show, focusing on things she knows she could be delegating, because she can't allow herself time to be alone with thoughts of anything other than work. Twenty minutes before they go to air he walks into her office and stands in front of her desk, the silence in the room so heavy it feels almost like a third person.

"I'm not going to stick around after the show, I don't want...any fuss, I guess," he says, calmly.

"Right." She forces herself to look up at him, desperately fighting the urge to stand up, grab his hand and beg him to stay. "I...let's make your last show a good one, yeah?"

"It's not always good?" A tiny smile twitches at the corner of his mouth, the first hint of humour between them in a week, uncoiling something inside her, something that hurts.

"It's _mostly_ good." She shrugs, watching his face as closely as he's watching hers. "But tonight's really needs to be...great."

"Alright then," he says with a nod, the smile gone. "No pressure."

"None whatsoever," she says, her eyes on his, taking a final opportunity to drink in their softness, to catalogue the exact shade of blue as she prepares for goodbye, farewell, or whatever this turns out to be. "Good show, Billy."

"You too." He takes a step back but stops again, and her heart stutters briefly, a tiny flicker of hope taking hold of her. "I'll...I _will_ keep in touch, I promise."

Her brain tries to formulate a response but fails, shutting down the ability to speak at all, and she can offer nothing more than a frantic nod, a half smile, as she feels her chest tighten, a slow realisation that this is it, for how long she doesn't know. He gives a tight smile and she watches him walk away, out of her office and essentially out of her life.

They do manage a good show, she's proud of it, proud of _him_. The control room empties, she hears the murmurings around her as her staff starts to leave, ready for their weekends to begin. She mumbles goodnight as they file out, but her eyes stay firmly fixed on Will as he remains at the anchor desk, earpiece still in, staring blankly at the papers in front of him. She can hear him breathing softly in her ear, and she can't bring herself to cut the feed, needing to have him with her for as long as she can before he's gone for good. After what feels like hours of silence, he finally pulls out his earpiece and glances up at the camera, giving her a long, inscrutable look, before standing and striding slowly from the studio.

Sliding her headset down and dropping it onto the desk, she reaches for her phone, overwhelmed by the need to tell him one more time how she feels, frustrated by her shaking hands as she tries to type.

_I don't expect a response, I just need to make sure you know something...I love you, Billy. Only you, always you, xx_

*

They move her to ten o'clock, which is fine, it isn't like she has a life outside work anymore anyway, and they thought it worked to bring in an anchor/producer team who could take on eight o'clock and make it their own. She manages perfectly well with the ten o'clock crew, they make a decent show, with hard news, and the ratings are solid, but her heart isn't in it. She can't bring herself to watch Will for the first week after he leaves, and when she does it's like a punch to the gut; his face looks the same, sure, but his eyes are hollow and filled with sadness. It reactivates her guilt, reminds her that _she_ did this, she made both of them miserable and now they're miles apart, each clearly suffering at the hands of her fucking stupidity.

Two weeks after he goes, she talks to one of the other EPs and hears about an opening for a field reporter, so she makes some calls, says she's ready for a change and that some on-camera work might refresh her outlook a little. Three weeks and two days since Will flew to New York, she's booked onto a flight to Kabul and there's no turning back. It's a three month contract initially with a possibility of extension, and she signs without hesitation. She needs something different, something difficult, she needs a focus besides her own misery, and she wants to prove to herself that she can do this.

He kept his word and she's had three emails from him. Short emails, but contact nonetheless, asking how things are going on ten o'clock, letting her know how things are in New York, at ACN, all strictly work talk, nothing more. He never responded to her message the night he left, and she hasn't mentioned it, she's just so ridiculously relieved that they're still in contact, for the tiny thread of hope it gives her to hang onto. She starts an email, deletes what she's written, rewrites, stops to make tea, rereads and finally hits send.

_Hey Billy_

_So...I've made a decision. I've been doing a lot of thinking since you left and it goes without saying that I miss you, but it also turns out I really don't even like being in DC without you. Everywhere I go reminds me of you, and makes me mad at myself all over again for what I did, to you, to us...so I'm taking another posting, some foreign coverage, field reporting this time. It's been a while but heck, how hard can being in front of the camera be, right? ;) I'm heading out to Afghanistan- for three months initially but if I want to stay longer (and if I haven't gone and got myself shot or blown up...), there may be an option to extend._

_I think it'll be good, a change of scenery, of pace, time to...I was going to say to think, but actually thinking is all I do, I really need to get out of my own head and I guess a war zone is the place to do it. The plan is for a regular piece about halfway through CNN's eight o'clock- I guess those fuckers feel bad for stealing my slot after you left ;) Anyway, I leave on Tuesday, so there's no going back now! I'll be in touch once I'm there and have some kind of workable phone/internet signal._

_I love you. Mackenzie, xx_

She makes another tea, pauses in the doorway to take in the sight of everything she owns packed into boxes ready to go into storage for the next however many months, and tries to ignore the fact that she's going to come back to nowhere to live. She knows she needs to start thinking about what to take with her, she has a list of suggested items from one the producers who arrived back from Islamabad a month ago, but the whole idea starts to terrify her when she thinks about the actuality of it. When she sits back down and looks at her email, she sees that his reply came back almost immediately in response to hers.

_Mackenzie-_

_Field reporting, huh? Jesus though, Kabul! You couldn't start out with something easy? No, it's you, of course you couldn't. Well, you're an amazing EP, you know that, but that face of yours was made to be on camera, and if a change is what you need then I guess Afghanistan is about as different as it gets._

_In solidarity, I've been avoiding watching eight o'clock (pretty easy since I'm actually on air then, but it's the the principle of the thing, right?) since they shifted you to ten, but hell, I guess I can suck it up and tape the thing. Or DVR, whatever the damn term is these days._

_Listen, as dumb as this probably sounds when you're headed into a war zone, I know- be safe, Mac._

_-W_

It's as close to an 'I love you' as she can expect at this point, and she knows him well enough to know he's probably in a panic at the thought of where she's about to go, what she might face, regardless of how things are between them. Fleetingly, she thinks about the possibility that something terrible _could_ happen, the number of disclaimers and insurance forms she had to sign having certainly done their job of reminding her of the reality of her decision. She also knows thinking this way is no help at all, she needs to be strong, positive, ready for any eventuality, and she knows she can do it, she just fears she may be throwing herself into this for all the wrong reasons. Chiding herself for her momentary introspection, her self-indulgence, she finishes her tea, reaches for the list printed out beside her, and heads to the bedroom to start packing.


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _Four weeks in and the culture shock is finally starting to recede, but God, she aches all over. They spend so much of their time running, carrying equipment, setting up in a hurry, and there's no time for any reporter versus producer bullshit, everybody simply dives in and gets things done._

Four weeks in and the culture shock is finally starting to recede, but God, she aches all over. They spend so much of their time running, carrying equipment, setting up in a hurry, and there's no time for any reporter versus producer bullshit, everybody simply dives in and gets things done. It's hard, probably the hardest thing she's ever done, both mentally and physically, and on the bad days she just wants to curl up and cry herself to sleep rather than spend hours in the back of a jeep, her back aching from the bump of the roads. On the really bad days she wants nothing more than to just give up and go home, somewhere with a hot bath to sink into, where she doesn't spend every minute sweating, where being constantly on alert isn't a prerequisite for survival. But on the good days, she runs on adrenaline, thrives on the pace, on the skill of the whole team, and the rewards come in the form of the reports they're filing, the news they're sharing with the audiences back home. What they're reporting on is important, it needs to be seen, and she's passionate about making sure her work is the best it can be. She's never been one to care about ratings, she's always been more about the story, the quality of the news she's covering, but this time CNN are pleased with both, so there's little pressure to change what they're doing.

She has a young producer with her, and she hesitates to say he's following her around like an eager puppy, but...he's following her around like an eager puppy. She doesn't know if he's genuinely just desperate to impress, or if he has a little bit of crush, but either way he's a good kid. He's just turned twenty-four, and he's keen to learn, he's quick to jump into any situation without needing to be prompted, and she fairly certain that under the right guidance he could be a great EP one day.

Will has been in touch, by email and text mostly, once by phone when she first arrived, and he's worried, she can tell, but he's also complimentary about her broadcasts, vaguely referencing a joking fear of her ratings overtaking his. In reply she tells him the day he reports with gunfire behind him is the day he deserves to win the ratings war, and he comes back with nothing more than a "Fuck, Mackenzie, stay safe, _please_."

It's almost five in the afternoon, and she and the crew have been in a hotel since last night, a semi decent hotel too, with hot water and a bar, but they leave in the morning so she's making the most of it. There's a small terrace outside, and it's quiet and shaded, so she heads down for half an hour before she needs to shower and meet everyone else for dinner, just to sit alone, away from the noise, from the constant movement. She has water, fruit, and a comfortable chair, and when she closes her eyes she can almost pretend she's at a resort somewhere, Will dozing beside her, just like on their trip to Mexico. It all feels so long ago now, the good times with him, and she's so lost in her own thoughts that when her phone buzzes it makes her jump and she grabs it, her heart racing when she sees it's a message from Will, like he knew she was thinking about him. Of course whenever she isn't in chaos, or on camera, she more often than not is thinking about him...she misses him even more now she's so far from home, now that it feels like he's a world away. She looks at her watch, calculates quickly that it's not even eight in the morning in New  
York, and reaches for her phone.

_'Couldn't sleep so watched your piece from last night. It was great, Mac, I hope you know you're doing good things out there.'_

She sends a quick message back saying thanks and asking how he is, adding a kiss as she always does and probably always will. There's no response and after what feels like forever she reaches for her water, starting to think that was it, a quick message from him with no intention to start a conversation, so when his next message comes through she stares at it in disbelief.

_'If you're not in the middle of something right now, can you talk? I mean, if you want to...'_

Her heart pounds at the thought of hearing his voice for the first time in almost a month, and something inside her unravels at the fact that he's the one who's initiating it. She takes a deep breath and a gulp of water, her mouth suddenly dry and her chest tight in anticipation as she taps out her reply.

_'Perfect timing, actually, and yes, I'd love to talk, xx'_

She's afraid to move in case the perfectly decent signal drops out before he can reach her, which she knows is ridiculous, but her need to talk to him is all-consuming, her smile automatic when his name appears and the phone starts to ring. Making no attempt to play any kind of game, she answers almost immediately.

"Hey," she says quietly, cradling the phone against her ear like it's the most precious thing in the world.

"Mackenzie..." The way he says her name, his low voice dragging across the syllables, sends her stomach into a series of frenzied somersaults. "How's the signal? Can you hear me okay?"

"Perfectly. You'd never know we were 7,000 miles apart," she says, and even as she says it she can feel every mile between them. "So...you couldn't sleep?"

"Nah, but you know me, sleep isn't my strongest point." There's a second of weighted silence and she thinks about their nights together, how she used to be able to lull him to sleep and she wonders if he's thinking of the same thing. "Anyway, how's it going over there?"

"It's...good seems like the wrong word, I think, but it's..." She pauses, sighing, struggling to believe he's right there at the end of the line. "It's going well, we're getting some good footage, the network seems pleased-"

"They should be pleased. Is it safe? Are _you_ safe?" He cuts in and she senses that's what he really wanted to ask right from the start, his protective side clearly still in play.

"I'm fine, I...it's mostly okay, the crew and I travel in something of a pack, I'm alright, Will, really," she says, suddenly wishing with a fierce longing that she was with him, that she had his hand to hold. "I'm as safe as I can be."

"Good, that's good." She hears him let out a relieved sigh, and she's confused all over again, wondering what he'd say if she were to beg him now to take her back and give things another chance, or if she's reading too much into a basic concern for her safety. "You're...you're doing a good job, Mac, a really good job, and you look great on camera. Hardly surprising, I know, but well, you do."

"Seriously, Billy, I'm sweaty, I wash my hair twice a week if I'm lucky..." She pushes her hair behind her ear, savouring the fact that it's clean today, thanks to the hotel shower. "Even if I start off looking decent my make-up slides off my face before the camera is even rolling most days-"

"Jesus, woman, take a compliment, would you?" She can hear the smile in his voice and it sends a warmth running through her that she hasn't felt since before he left for New York.

"Alright," she says, her own smile creeping onto her lips and feeling almost alien to her. "Thanks."

"I should go," he says, and her heart sinks slightly, even though she could have guessed it was going to be a brief call. "I really just wanted to check in, see how you're doing, you know."

"I miss you." She blurts it out before she can change her mind, biting her lip and feeling his silence like a heavy blanket.

"Me too." It's barely a murmur but she hears it and she can't reply, can barely catch her breath. "Be safe, Mackenzie."

He's gone before she has time to think, let alone to say anything, and she sits for a minute trying to take in that he called, he sounded worried, and not only did he not freak out when she said she misses him, he admitted to the same thing. Something catches her eye and she looks up to see Jim hovering awkwardly at the corner of the terrace. She wonders how much, if any, of her conversation he heard, before she decides she doesn't really care.

"Sorry, I, um, I was just..." He scratches his head, smiles at her, his sweet and slightly lop-sided smile. "I think the plan is for dinner in about an hour or so, so anyone who wants to crash early tonight can, if that's okay with you?"

"Sounds good, Jim, thanks." She nods, managing a smile back, thankful for his lack of questioning so far, despite it probably being obvious she's here at least partially because she's running from something, someone.

"Everything okay?" he asks, frowning slightly and gesturing at the phone she's still holding in her hand.

"Oh, yeah, everything's fine," she says, putting the phone down and reaching again for her water. "I'll see you at dinner."

*

Jim’s right about the majority of the crew wanting to crash early, taking advantage of a second night in a real bed, knowing it could be weeks before it happens again after they get back on the road tomorrow. They’re going deeper into the country, and she knows it’s because CNN is so pleased with the work they’re doing, but it’s nerve wracking to think they’ll be further from civilisation, less likely to be contactable, more vulnerable. It’s what she signed up for though, she knows that, and her apprehension mingles with excitement.

She realises she’s had more to drink than she intended when she looks up and finds that Jim is her only remaining company, and she wonders briefly if that’s deliberate, if he would much rather be in bed too, but feels some sense of duty to make sure she’s okay. It’s sweet if that’s the case.  
Ridiculous, but sweet.

“You know, you can head to bed, Jim,” she says, taking a sip from another bottle of beer that seems to have ended up in front of her. “Don’t think you have to stay and keep me company. I’ll finish this drink and then I’ll go and get some sleep.”

“Nah, I’m good. I have a fresh beer to get through too,” he gestures to his bottle and they fall into a companionable silence.

“So what brought you out here, young Jim Harper?” she asks, curiously suddenly about this quiet young producer who she spends every day with but knows nothing about. “There are more pleasant ways to see the big, wide world, I’m sure of it.”

“I don’t know, really.” He shrugs, takes another drink, looks at her. “I was working out of Atlanta, as a runner, then I started producing, and I wanted to get to DC or New York.”

“I don’t know how to break it to you, but this is neither, I think you’ve been duped.” She raises an eyebrow, watches a faint grin cross his face.

“They said you were smart, they never mentioned funny,” he says.

“Well, I am funny. I’m fucking hilarious.” She grins back at him. “Go on though, you wanted to get to DC or New York?”

“Yeah, I did, still do, actually,” he says, nodding at her. “I asked around, put some feelers out but there wasn’t anything available. Then one of the senior producers told me it always looks good to put yourself out there, throw yourself into something that might get you noticed, or taken seriously, I guess. So I figured…well, if foreign coverage isn’t throwing myself into something, I don’t know what the fuck is.”

"Whoever gave you that advice was dead right, it’ll pay off,” she says, smiling at him and reaching again for her drink. “Unless none of us go home alive, of course, which is possible.”

“That’s helpful, thanks.” He lets out a laugh, and she’s glad he seems to have taken it less seriously than she meant it.

“You’re welcome.” She holds up her bottle in salute and he shakes his head at her. “You’re a good producer, Jim, you have a real talent. Stick at it here for the duration and DC would be crazy not to snap you up.”

“Thanks.” He falls quiet but she senses he has questions, so she waits, unsurprised when he continues after a few seconds. “What about you? You have a pedigree already, a reputation, a _Peabody_...you don’t need to be out here, that’s for sure.”

“Oh, you never know, maybe I’ll get my second Peabody while we’re here. That’ll definitely get you noticed.” she says, giving him a slight smirk. “Apart from that, it was time for a change, I suppose, and it’s been a few years since I’ve been on camera, I guess I wanted to prove I could still do it.”

“Your boyfriend doesn’t miss you…like, he knows you’re here, right?” He looks awkward suddenly, embarrassed. “Sorry, I…I heard you on the phone, I figured that was your boyfriend. Shit, sorry, it’s none of my business.”

“It’s fine, really.” She smiles reassuringly at him, his nerves strangely endearing. “We’ve been together for two years, we met at work, and way back when we were first dating, before we were serious, I did something stupid, something really fucking stupid, and then a couple of months ago when it seemed like we were thinking about marriage, I told him about it, because I’m an idiot and I thought I should be honest. So now we’re…God, I don’t know what we are. He said he needed some space, and I gave him 7,000 miles of it. I don’t know what I’m going to go home to and if I’m honest, I’m fucking terrified I’ve blown it with him for good.”

“But you’re still in touch, right?” he asks, frowning at her, clearly not oblivious to the tears brimming in her eyes, which she will absolutely blame on a combination of exhaustion, beer, and hearing Will’s voice after so many weeks. “I mean, surely that’s a good sign?”

“You think?” She watches his eyes widen, and he gives a faint shrug of his shoulders as he picks up his beer.

“I’m, like, the worst person in the world you should take relationship advice from, but yeah, I can’t see him keeping in touch if he was just going to cut you off when you get back home,” he says, pausing to take a long slug from his bottle as she does the same.

“I hope you’re right,” she murmurs, letting out a sigh. “You know when I was a little girl, I had it so firmly set in my mind that I’d be an EP by the time I was twenty-eight, married by thirty-two, with a baby by thirty-five. It’s funny how things don’t quite go as you think they will, isn’t it?”

“Hell, I thought I’d be exploring Mars by now.” He gives her a sheepish smile, and she can quite easily picture an eight-year-old Jim Harper with his big plans to be astronaut. “Pretty sure your plans have a better chance of happening than mine.”

“I’ll be thirty-two in three months, Jim, I’m looking at a pretty limited window,” she says, a sudden sadness washing over her as she thinks again about what she may have ruined. “And I’d never met anyone I wanted a baby with until I met Billy, so if it is over with him then I can cross that off my list right now.”

“The thing is, I know I don’t know him, and I haven’t known you all that long…” He blushes faintly and she finds herself smiling at how sweet it is. “But I do know he’d be crazy to let you go.”

“I have a Peabody, _and_ I’m hilarious, you’re right, he'd be fucking insane to let me slip away…anyway, I think it’s probably time I called it a night.” She drains the last of her beer, standing up and grabbing the back of her chair to steady herself. Resting her hand on his shoulder, she squeezes lightly, suddenly overwhelmed with gratitude for his quiet, unquestioning support. “Thanks, Jim, you’re a good guy.”

“Look, I’m frequently wrong, about pretty much everything, I’m going to put that out there right now,” he says, stopping her as she starts to walk away. “But I just…I don’t think you should give up hope just yet, Mac. We need to hang on to whatever hope we can out here, right?”

“Right.” She nods, smiling at him, and giving his shoulder a final squeeze before turning for the door. “Goodnight, Jim.”


	5. Chapter 5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _The ringing in her ears is the first thing she's aware of. The taste of blood in her mouth is the second. The third, and the thing that kicks her into action, is the sight of Jim on the ground beside her, completely and terrifyingly still._

The ringing in her ears is the first thing she's aware of. The taste of blood in her mouth is the second. The third, and the thing that kicks her into action, is the sight of Jim on the ground beside her, completely and terrifyingly still.

She sits up gingerly, biting back a cry of pain when she puts her weight on her hands to push herself up and knows instantly that her wrist is broken. It's been a few years, but she knows the feeling, it's her left wrist, the one she suspects has been left slightly weakened by a previous bad break. Dammit, six weeks in a fucking cast is the last thing she needs right now. Rolling over, she ignores the sudden nausea that rises up, instead crawling over to Jim, using just her good hand, kneeling down in the dust and leaning over him. Her own breaths are harsh, ragged, and she channels her focus on him, pushing his hair from his face and calling his name, softly at first and then louder, more urgent.

"Listen to me, Jim. I did _not_ come out here to have a hand in killing off my producer. Open your fucking eyes!" She shuffles awkwardly so she can rest her good hand on his chest, but she's shaking so hard she can't possibly tell if there's any movement there. "The last thing I need on my conscience as well as everything else is some kid dying on me. Come on, Jim, just-"

"For the millionth time, I'm not a kid." His voice is barely a whisper but it's there, he's alive and apparently well enough to protest her description. "The fuck happened?"

"I'm not sure, but I'd guess at an IED," she says, glancing around to see the rest of the crew in various states of hurt and confusion, but noting with relief that everyone seems to be moving. "What I don't need to guess at is that my wrist is broken, you have a cut on your head that's going to need stitching, and we all need to move the fuck out of here right now."

She watches as he sits up, groaning and reaching for his head, turning slightly pale when his fingers come away covered in blood, his eyes widening. A quick look at his forehead leaves her pretty sure the wound isn't bad enough that they need worry too much, but hell, she's not a doctor, so she'll feel better about it when they get to someone who can look at it. Not to mention someone is going to need to set her damn wrist. Glancing down at her legs, she realises she's probably in need of stitches too, and she sighs, more in frustration at the inconvenience than in pain, although she knows when the adrenaline wears off, her wrist is going to hurt like a bitch.

"Jim...hey, look at me. Head wounds bleed like crazy even when they're not all that bad. I think it's to remind us of our own mortality...or something, I don't know." She keeps her attention on him, knowing that if she can concentrate on getting him looked at, she can keep her cool. Her own injuries can wait. "Can you stand, do you think?"

"Um, I think so," he says and she watches him frown as she winces and cradles her wrist. "You okay?"

"Yeah, I'm okay," she says with a shrug. "My wrist's broken, I think I'm second in line for stitches, and some kind of demented bell ringing team seems to have set up residence in my head, but other than that, I'm fine."

"Fuck, Mac, you have a seriously messed up definition of fine." He stands, slowly and tentatively, holding out his hand and waiting for her to let him help her up. "For the record, I think my bell ringing team would put up some damn good competition against yours right now. Is that an actual thing, bell ringing?"

"Yes, it's an actual thing," she says, pausing, looking over at where the other members of their crew appear to have made it back to the jeep, which is thankfully still in one piece. "How far do you think we are from the closest medic centre?"

"No idea," he says, shaking his head as they edge towards the jeep. "I don't remember passing one in, like, _hours_ , but maybe there's one up ahead?"

She knows he's guessing and he appreciates the effort even though they both know there's a good chance they'll be on the road for hours before any of them gets the medical attention they need. She decides not to think about how much fun the bumpy terrain is going to be with a broken wrist, let alone how there's always the possibility that it isn't a clean break...she really, _really_ doesn't want it to need resetting.

Somehow they have a sound technician who's still in a fit state to drive and they make it back out onto the road. She doesn't know how long they've been driving when she finds herself letting out an unexpected giggle and looks up to find four pairs of eyes on her, each as confused as the next.

"Sorry." She smiles and shakes her head, questioning her twisted sense of humour at the same time as she clings to it. "I was just thinking...we look like we're in some alternative Wizard of Oz remake, hobbling along, no fucking idea whether the wizard is five miles away or five hundred."

"Well, Dorothy, seems like we're in luck." She's not sure who speaks, she's too distracted by the sight of the military tent she spots out of the window and the feeling of relief that runs through her.

*

_Good segment tonight, Mac. But what in the name of fuck happened to you?_

No preamble, no small talk, Will's email contains just that, one line that lets her know her injuries haven't gone unnoticed. Thank God the faint bruises on her face and the cast on her wrist are all he's seen so far. She's pretty sure she can predict what his reaction would be to the current state of her shrapnel savaged legs, and she's glad they'll be all healed before she sees him again in person. Something sinks inside her when she realises she just made the assumption that she will see him again, even though there's still a chance that he's going to say he's had time to think and actually, it's over, for good. He's not an idiot so she knows he won't buy it if she tells him it was nothing, but she's sure as shit not going to tell him she has twelve stitches, that it took an hour for the shrapnel to be picked from her shins, and that when her ears were still ringing three days after the blast she feared they might never stop. Sighing, she starts to type.

_I'm fine, it looks worse than it is. We got caught a little too close to a roadside explosion. I have a broken wrist, some cuts and bruises, it's nowhere near as bad as it could've been. How are you? How's New York?_

She needs something normal from him, conversation that doesn't revolve around life and death, that doesn't feel like she's being admonished for daring to get herself injured. When his email pings right back, she knows before she opens it that there's no way she's going to get any kind of normal from him right now, but she reads it anyway.

_A total lack of roadside explosions here, thankfully. Do you think maybe you've done whatever it is you wanted to do over there? Made whatever point you were trying to prove? You could get out now and know you've done a great job these last few months, you know. It's not a sign of weakness to admit when you've hit your limit, Mackenzie._

And with that, she's angry with him, angry that he seems to have managed to turn his fears for her into some kind of insinuation that she's ready to quit. He knows as well as she does that she wouldn't be here at all if not for what happened between them, but now she _is_ here, there's no way one incident is going to send her running home with her tail between her legs. Especially when she has no idea what she would be running home to. Taking a deep breath, she only realises she's hitting the keys with an uncharacteristic aggression when she sees Jim lift his head from the book he's reading across the room, his eyebrows raised.

_Oh, I get it. I get a little scraped up and you decide I've hit my limit? Wow, thanks for the vote of confidence, Will, it's much appreciated. And what? Suddenly you give a shit for my safety? Funny, you knew what I was walking into three months ago and it didn't seem to bother you then. I'm doing a good job here, making a difference, being a journalist. I'm sorry if that offends your ratings-obsessed sensibilities._

As soon as she sends it, she knows what she wrote was unfair, but she needs him to know it's unfair of him to suddenly shift back into protective mode simply because she's been injured and it has somehow brought home to him the reality of what she's dealing with. Slamming the laptop shut, she stands up, pushing her hair behind her ear, grimacing at how in need of a wash her hair is.

"Jim...?" She glances over at him, biting her lip, gesturing to her head, hating to have to ask again, frustrated that she can't quite manage to wash her own damn hair with her stupid cast on.

"Hair?" he asks, raising an eyebrow and smiling when she nods.

Poor Jim has been washing her hair twice a week since she broke her wrist, never complaining, yet never quite losing the look of trepidation when the time comes. She can't help thinking of Will and how they used to shower together, his hands weaving gently into her hair, his fingers massaging her scalp so tenderly that the memory brings unexpected tears to her eyes. It isn't that Jim's hands remind her of Will's- far from it, and leaning over a tiny sink in a grubby hotel bathroom was certainly never how Will washed her hair, but still, the comparison is a stark reminder of everything she's missing.

She's startled out of her thoughts by the sound of her phone and when Jim offers to check it she says yes initially and watches as he dries his hands, before changing her mind as he's about to step out of the room to grab it, a frown on his face when she stops him with a hand on his arm.

"Leave it," she says quickly.

"You sure?" He asks with a frown. "I can totally grab it, it's-"

"I'm sure," she says, firmly, shaking her head at him. "Leave it, it's fine."

He nods, stepping back into position to finish off rinsing her hair. She's pretty sure it was Will on the phone and she feels a certain sense of satisfaction in knowing what she wrote in her email has clearly bugged him enough that he's trying to call her not ten minutes later. It comes as no surprise when the phone rings again as she's towelling off her hair, and this time she picks it up.

"Are you calling to tell me what you think I should do next with my life?" She's aware of Jim across the room, sitting on the other bed, trying desperately to look like he isn't listening." Because I don't really want to hear it, I just-"

"I'm worried about you, Mac, that's all." He cuts in, his tone sharp, abrupt, irritating her again.

"Funny, because when I told you I was leaving for Kabul you didn't seem all that worried, you told me to be safe and then you hung up. What's changed? Have you just realised you can't tell me to be safe and expect it to be that simple?" She knows she's asking questions she's giving him no chance to answer, but she can't seem to help it. "Whatever, I'm perfectly capable of taking care of myself."

"Yeah, that cast on your wrist is just screaming that you're doing fine," he says, a small huff of bitter laughter backing his words up. "I'm not telling you what to do, you know I'd never do that. All I'm saying is maybe now is a good time to take stock and think about whether it might be time to come home-"

"Are you saying _you_ want me to come home, Billy?" She sees Jim glance over and quickly turn his attention back to his book when he eyes meet his. "Because that puts a very different spin on the question."

"I'm not..." He pauses and she feels a tremor of panic grip her as she realises he's about to say no, he doesn't want her to come home. "I'm just saying-"

"Look, it's irrelevant anyway." She stops him, her panic converting quickly to defensiveness, self- preservation. "They've asked me about extending my contract, doing another six weeks here, maybe more."

"And?" The question hangs heavy on the line as she sighs.

"And I'm thinking about it," she says, knowing that Jim's been offered the same but that neither has raised it with the other.

"Well, if you feel like it's going so well out there, I guess maybe you should." His cold tone takes her back to the night she left his apartment, when his ability to shut her out so instantly had caught her so horribly by surprise.

"Right, well, maybe I will," she says, waiting for a protest from him she knows won't come. "Listen, I really have to go-"

"Mac..." He cuts in but says nothing more, his frustration palpable.

"I'll talk to you soon." She ends the call before he has chance to respond, throwing the phone onto the bed and glancing up at Jim. "Sorry about that."

"It's fine," he says quietly, staring at his book for a few seconds before folding the page and putting it down. "Dumb question, but...is everything okay?"

"I don't know, I just feel like whenever we talk it feels like we take two steps forward, ten steps back," she says with a sigh. "I wish I knew what he wanted. Hell, I wish _he_ knew what he wanted."

"What about what _you_ want?" Jim surprises her, and himself too if the look on his face is any reflection. "Sorry, it's really none of my damn business-"

"No, it's fair enough. You do keep ending up having to listen to our endless fucking drama..." She's not annoyed, there's a huge part of her that knows he's right, she shouldn't be waiting for Will to call the shots, yet she can't shake the belief that it's only fair after what she did. "Sorry."

"So..." He takes a breath, changes the subject. "They asked me about extending too, I was going to talk to you about it but I wasn't sure if-"

"I'd be happy to agree to another six weeks, if you would?" She knows she's probably being hasty but right now she doesn't feel like there's much to go home for, and six weeks seems like a decent compromise. "What do you think?"

"I think...yeah, another six weeks can't hurt, right?" There's a hint of a smile on Jim's face which suggests he'd been hoping she might want to extend but hadn't want to be presumptuous.

"Alright then." She nods and smiles back at him. "Another six weeks it is."

Laying back against her pillow, she wonders if this could be just what Will needs, another few weeks without her, knowing where she is and what the potential dangers are. Something in the back of her mind also tells her it could be the extra time he needs to decide he _doesn't_ want her back, and as much as the thought fills her with panic, it's a chance she has to take.


	6. Chapter 6

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _It's been two weeks, three days. He knows they didn't end their last conversation well (God knows he's been beating himself up over it ever since), but there's no way, in the face of the sheer volume of emails he's been sending since, that she could, or would, ignore him._

It's been two weeks, three days. He knows they didn't end their last conversation well (God knows he's been beating himself up over it ever since), but there's no way, in the face of the sheer volume of emails he's been sending since, that she could, or _would_ , ignore him. Even if it was to say nothing more than 'leave me the fuck alone', she would reply, he knows she would, so every day the uneasy feeling in the pit of his stomach grows stronger.

The phone rings and he lunges for it, grateful for something to shake him from his current mood, although the serious tone of Charlie's voice asking him to head upstairs does nothing to ease his ever increasing panic.

"Now, I don't want you to flip out, Will, but..." Charlie hands him a glass, sits down and gestures to him to do the same.

"No sentence that starts out that way is ever going to end well." He sits opposite Charlie, as instructed, cataloguing the frown on the older man's face, the concern in his eyes as he looks across the desk. "What's going on, Charlie?"

"About an hour ago, I got a call from an old colleague, a friend, over at NBC, and he said this hasn't hit the wires yet, but..." Charlie pauses and takes a hard slug from his glass, sighing heavily. "It seems that a news crew has gone off radar, and this morning my old buddy was reliably informed, and yes, before you ask, by a trusted source, that they've been kidnapped. Now, it's-"

"Whose crew? Which network?" He asks, panic coursing through his veins as he tries to take in what he's hearing. "Charlie, which network?"

"We don't know, Will. We don't know much at all right now, there's been no ransom demand, no video, nobody claiming responsibility," Charlie says, his tone level, irritatingly calm. "What we do know is there are two networks with crews in the area who haven't yet been in touch to confirm their safety. BBC Worldwide and...CNN."

"Fuck, fuck, fuck." He stands up and moves over to the window, suddenly unable to look at Charlie, his hand shaking as he runs it through his hair.

"Will..." Charlie's voice holds a warning, a note that suggests Will needs to take a breath, to not jump to the obvious conclusion, but it's way too late for that. "We know nothing more than that, there's nothing to be gained from making the assumption that-"

"I've been trying to get hold of her for over two weeks. Two fucking weeks, Charlie." He stops suddenly, a wave of fresh panic rushing through him, the thought of this being her crew more than he can deal with. "She hasn't filed a single report in that time, but nor have I heard she's coming home. I've sent emails, texts, a shit ton of them, and I've had nothing back from her. I've left voicemails but she hasn’t returned any of them...we didn't...the last conversation we had didn't end on a great note, and I just figured she'd decided to stay mad at me for a while, but what if-"

"Don't do this, Will." Charlie stops him before he can finish his sentence, standing up and walking over to him. "Seriously, this isn't going to help. You're a fucking journalist, you know the danger of jumping to conclusions without any of the facts-"

"What I _know_ is if that conversation turns out to be the last contact I had with her..." He stops, feeling the room spin around him as he thinks about how he not only let her walk away a few months ago, he all but sent her running into a war zone. "If that's it, I'll...I'll never fucking forgive myself."

"Listen to me, right now you need to go back downstairs, pull your team together, and focus on tonight's show. I'll call you the second I have any update." Charlie's tone is firm, offering no further discussion. "Anything at all. You have my word."

It's all he needs, it's all he's ever needed from Charlie, so he takes a deep breath, nods, and walks out, back to his own office.

He tries to channel his thoughts into tonight's show, but it's impossible when all he can do is picture Mackenzie, both the happy, lively Mackenzie of just a few months ago, and the more serious, weary Mackenzie he saw on his TV screen each night after she left. He emails again, desperation weighing him down as he thinks of where she might be, what she could be going through. He tells her he's been wondering if she decided to extend her contract, and that he hopes she thought about it and didn't make a rash decision based on their last conversation. He makes it clear that obviously it’s completely her decision, and he’ll support her whatever she does, but that he’s hearing things that are terrifying him, and that he’s desperately trying to convince himself she’s out of range and that’s why he hasn’t been able to get hold of her. He feels sick thinking about his conversation with Charlie, and as he types his final words to her he can't stop picturing her face, the face he misses so damn much.

_Look, I know I was an ass the last time we talked and I'm sorry. I don’t blame you for being mad, Mackenzie, I really don't. You can yell at me first chance you get, but right now I just need to know if you’re okay, I need to not have the possible scenarios running through my head that I have right now. Jesus, honey, please just let me know you're alright, even if it’s literally one line to say ‘leave me the fuck alone, I’m fine’. Right now, I’d take that, I swear. I'm an idiot, I miss you. Every damn day I miss you. Just...let me know you're okay._

_W, xx_

*

He doesn't sleep much at all, but when he does his dreams are filled with visions so horrific he's afraid to close his eyes, images of her telling him she's sorry, that she misses him, followed by her kneeling in the sand, blindfolded and biting her lip until it bleeds. In the worst one, she somehow pulls the blindfold off, her eyes deep pools of shimmering darkness as she looks up and murmurs his name, followed by a desperate "I love you", before a shot rings out and he wakes in a cold sweat.

Going home each night, spending his time staring at photos of her, a bottle of scotch beside him, is no way to deal with what’s happening, he knows that, but it’s what he does anyway, it's _all_ he can manage to do. With each photo, he remembers another thing he misses about her; her bright, wide eyes, so frequently curious, the chocolate smudge freckle on her shoulder, her long legs in shorts…hell, her legs in anything. Over the last few months he’s spent a lot of time furious with himself at his reaction to what she told him, his own complete refusal to even try to think clearly before removing her unceremoniously and almost instantly from his life. More than ever, he knows he loves her, he's certain he wants to spend the rest of his life with her, and he desperately hopes it isn’t too late. He hasn’t told her he’s been seeing a therapist, twice a week before work, and that it's starting to help, although fuck, it's hard work. He's finally starting to see that her betrayal is nothing like his father’s, and that neither his treatment at the hands of his father nor her transgression bear any reflection on him or make him the shitty person he more often than not thinks he is. The simple truth is that she made an error in judgement, a mistake, and she confessed it to him out of honesty, not malice, and because she loved him, not because she didn’t.

Strains of their last phone call fill his mind when he’s in bed completely unable to sleep, the anger in her tone fuelled by what she saw as his attempts to control her, to tell her what to do, when his suggestions came solely from concern for her and a compelling need to know she’s somewhere safe. On the third night after his conversation with Charlie he wakes at five from yet another nightmare, this time one where she’s broadcasting live when a bomb goes off and he watches her hit the ground, none of crew able to cut the feed, the screen splattered with blood he knows instinctively is hers. He scrambles to the bathroom and empties his stomach of the minimal dinner he forced himself to eat the previous night, his throat burning, his eyes watering as he sits back and leans against the bathtub. He’s exhausted but he can’t bring himself to close his eyes again, paralysed by the fear of what lurks behind his eyelids, what horror his brain will conjure up. It's too late (or too early, really) to take a pill so he moves slowly towards the kitchen and settles for coffee instead.

He’s been meaning to call her parents for the last couple of days, finding himself totally overwhelmed by even the idea of hearing either of their voices each time he tried, but this time he picks up and before he can talk himself out of it dials their number.

“Hello?” Her father’s voice comes down the line, slightly cautious but as friendly as ever, and Will realises suddenly that of course they’re sitting by the phone too. Worrying, waiting, not knowing where their eldest daughter is, if she’s well, if she’s even alive.

“Hi Robert, it’s Will…Will McAvoy,” he says, feeling like an idiot for making the clarification but his embarrassment coming a second too late to pull the words back.

“Will…it's good to hear from you,” Robert says, sounding like he genuinely means it. “I don’t suppose you have any news, by any chance, do you?”

“No, I’m sorry, I don’t,” he answers quickly, sorry suddenly for giving them a glimmer of hope with his phone call. “I really just wanted to call…I don’t know, just see how you’re doing, I guess, Penny too. It seems like a stupid question now though.”

"In situations like this, I'm not sure there _are_ any stupid questions," Robert says, pausing for just a few seconds. "We're bearing up, just muddling through each day. There's not an awful lot more we can do, as I'm sure you're all too aware yourself. How are you holding up, Will?"

"I'm...I'm really not sure," he says, the weight of his fear growing heavier as he thinks of her parents and what they must be feeling, the niggling thought in the back of his mind that this is his fault, that he caused this. "I guess I just feel so helpless, and I just keep thinking if only I hadn't-"

"Now listen to me, if you're blaming yourself then you need to stop that right now." Robert cuts him off, firmly but with warmth running through his voice as always. "I don't know the details of what transpired before Mackie left, and nor should I, it's between the two of you. However, what I do know, as I'm sure you do too, is that when my daughter makes a decision there isn't a soul on earth who can change her mind. She's been that way since she was tiny, she's independent and headstrong, just like her mother, so-"

"Oh, I know how independent she is, and I love that about her, but if nothing had happened between us she wouldn't have gone, and if she _hadn't_ gone, well..." He trails off, unable to voice the dark thoughts, the horrific images that have plagued him for the last two weeks, not to her father, of all people.

"Will, there's no sense in going down that road. No sense at all." Robert's tone is firm, calm, and admirably strong in the face of everything. "I hate this as much as you do, more than once I've been tempted to just get on a plane over there, but I know it would be akin to searching for a needle in a bloody haystack. As frustrating as it is, I'm afraid all we can do is wait, and hope."

"I know, it's just..." He stops, not wanting to tell Robert how hard the waiting is when he knows it better than anyone, he's her father, and he adores his kids (God, he can't even imagine how frantic with worry Penny is). "Look, I don't want to keep you any longer, I really did just want to call and see how you were doing, but if you hear anything, would you...would you call me? I'll do the same, of course, if I get any news."

"We have ourselves a deal, Will," Robert says, the gentle smile clear in his voice. "And...I know how much Mackie loves you, and I do hope you know how fond Penny and I are of you too, so please, call whenever you want to, it's not an imposition, I promise you that."

"Alright, I will, thank you," he says, wondering what Mackenzie told them about why she was heading to Afghanistan, what they think promoted her decision, and he's suddenly sure that she painted him in nothing but a good light, a realisation that only heightens his guilt. "I'll talk to you soon."

He gets through the day on caffeine and nervous energy, trips over his words a handful of times during the broadcast, and when he gets home he doesn't sleep a wink, too scared to close his eyes and await whatever cruel visions his brain has in store. So when his phone rings at six the next morning he's wide awake, his second mug of coffee almost done, and a jolt of fear runs through him when Charlie's name flashes up on the screen.

"What happened?" He doesn't waste time with pleasantries, he knows Charlie's not calling for a casual chat at this hour.

"Details are pretty sketchy right now, but I just had confirmation it’s a BBC crew involved in the kidnapping," Charlie says, and he can sense the hint of relief in his voice.

"What about Mac's crew? Have CNN heard from them?" He desperately wants to talk to her, to hear her voice, know she's okay. "Did somebody call her parents? I talked to her dad, I said I'd call and let them know-"

"Will." Charlie stops him and he takes a breath, waits for whatever else Charlie has to say. "The CNN crew still haven’t reported in, but it's definitely a BBC team who've been kidnapped, London has had a list of demands, and they're asking for a media blackout so if everyone participates it's unlikely to hit the wires at all. It's not her, Will. It's not Mackenzie."

"So where the fuck is she, Charlie?" There's a faint sense of relief that it isn't her crew being held, mixed with sympathy for the BBC crew, but the overriding feeling is of frustration that he still has no idea where she is. "I know you can't answer that, I'm just...I don't know, thinking aloud, I guess."

"I know," Charlie says quietly, pausing for just a second. "I'm guessing you haven't slept, so why don't you try and grab a couple of hours now, head in a little later."

"Nah, I'm fine, I don't think I could sleep now anyway," he says, taking the final gulp of coffee from his mug, standing up from the table and walking over to the window. "I'm going to call her parents, just in case they haven't heard."

"Alright, well..." Charlie sighs, a long, weary sigh. "I'll see you at the office."

He hangs up and moves to the coffee pot, pouring another mug before taking a deep breath and dialling the McHales' number.


	7. Chapter 7

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _In just under two weeks she's going home. They offered another extension, and while she jumped at the last one, this time she wasn't sure, asked if she could think about it, and came to the conclusion that rather than staying because she feels she wants to do more here, she would be staying because she was avoiding going home._

Her relief at being back in Kabul, in a room with an actual bed, a real bathroom, after almost three weeks of living essentially in exile cannot be underestimated. She's tired, bone tired, and she aches all over, she feels every muscle, every bruise, every cut, and when she moves into the bathroom and catches sight of herself in the mirror, the stark light offering no kindness, she can’t help but wince. She feels frustration too, at the hours of footage they have, hours of great footage, much of it powerful and hard-hitting enough to take their reporting to another level, and none of it used yet. They were told in no uncertain terms not to raise their heads above the parapet and file any of it, not until the kidnapping threat had passed and they were able to be escorted safely back to the city.

She brushes her teeth before peeling off her tank top and staring more closely at herself in the mirror. The medics did a good job today, getting to her and the others and patching them up almost as they were dragging them from the protest that could have seen them all end up in a much worse situation than they did. Lifting her head, she sees her collarbone is almost completely shaded in angry purple, and the cut on her chin is bigger than she originally thought, but when she tentatively pulls back her bandage the slash across her arm is nowhere near as bad as she feared. It was all so frantic and she'd been so busy trying to stay standing, knowing that if she hit the ground she may never get to her feet again, that she hadn't seen the glint of the knife until the very last minute, and her immediate reaction had been to raise her arm, protect her face. She can't think about how bad it could have been had the sun not caught the blade just at the right moment, had she not seen it until it was too late and had someone, Jim she thinks, not spotted it too and pulled her far enough out of its reach that the wound she has pales in comparison to what it could have been.

In just under two weeks she's going home. They offered another extension, and while she jumped at the last one, this time she wasn't sure, asked if she could think about it, and came to the conclusion that rather than staying because she feels she wants to do more here, she would be staying because she was avoiding going home. Jim's leaving too, he told her he was ready and admitted with a sheepish smile that he felt like maybe they'd tempted fate one too many times. The network want to use the footage they haven't aired yet, and she and Jim have agreed to piece it together into something substantial on the promise that it will air as a stand-alone, a half hour report at least, so it feels like they'll both end with a final piece of work they can be really proud of.

She showers, standing under the spray until it starts to run cold, desperate to feel clean, _properly_ clean, for the first time in weeks, biting her lip as the water hits her skin, her cuts stinging, her bruises aching. Stepping into the bedroom, she looks at the time, knows she should call her parents, but decides to open up her emails first, unsurprised by the number of unread messages she has. She spots her parents' email address, her brother's, each of her sisters', and she realises they must have been worried, not knowing why she had suddenly disappeared, where she was, or if she was okay. She _is_ surprised by how many she has from Will, starting two days after they last spoke, building up to a regular stream, the last one having landed just hours earlier.

Their last conversation has played on her mind over and over, and the more time that passed the more she wondered if he would make the assumption she really didn't want to talk to him and would give up trying to reach her. The volume of emails would suggest that’s not the case, so she scrolls down and opens the earliest one, smiling at how clear it is that he thought she was giving him the cold shoulder after they last talked. The tone changes with each message, becoming noticeably more frantic, his guard coming down a little more each time, and she realises he must have heard about the kidnapping and feared the worst, something he confirms in the next email she reads. She keeps reading until she reaches the final one, her eyes widening and a lump rising in her throat as she sees his apology, his 'I miss you', and the two kisses at the end of the email, so painfully absent from his previous messages.

_Will-_

_I'm getting the sense you were a little bit worried...I'm fine. Well, fine may be a slight stretch, but I'm back in Kabul, in a hotel. Internet, food, and an actual bathroom- believe me, after three weeks in the back end of nowhere, just having hot water makes me feel like the Queen of Sheba. Things went a bit crazy after we found out about the kidnapping, and the network started to shit themselves, frankly. They weren't exactly very clear about it, but we're pretty sure they received a specific threat, because suddenly we were being accompanied by a Covert Ops team, and even if we'd had any internet access (which we didn't) we were explicitly told to stay off radar. It’s probably the closest I’ll ever get to feeling like a spy!_

_Anyway, we got back here this morning, under heavy escort, and ran straight into a bit of an incident, got caught up in the midst of a pretty lively protest. You won't be surprised to hear I grabbed a camera and decided we need to shoot, so we have pretty scary footage of it all going to hell. Before you panic, the bruises make it look a lot worse than it was. Anyway, now I'm here trying to make sense of your emails._

_I'm scared that you only said you missed me because you thought I was dead, and now that I've reappeared maybe you'll go right back to being furious with me again. You have every right to be angry, of course you do, but...I can't play games, not anymore. I spent night after night these last few weeks lying awake, thinking about you, wondering if you might be worried I hadn't been in touch, or worse, thinking maybe you wouldn't care at all. But I read your emails just now and I'm confused. I love you, that hasn't changed, and I've missed you every single day we've been apart, but I need to know how you feel, what you're thinking, because I'm coming home really soon and I'd like to know what I might be coming home to. I hope it's to you..._

_Ball's in your court, I think. Mackenzie, xx_

She tries not to think he's probably checking his email right now, even though a glance at the time tells her he's more than likely at his desk with his email open in front of him. Fighting the urge to refresh her emails, aware it's been mere seconds since she hit send, she replies to her parents latest message instead, letting them know she's fine, apologising for worrying them, and telling them she's exhausted but she'll call them when she’s had some sleep. There's a knock on the door, followed by Jim's voice asking if he can come in, so she calls back to tell him yes, grateful for the distraction.

"Hey, I can't find my damn phone charger, could I use yours?" he asks, the smile on his face slipping slightly as his eyes land on the bruise spreading across her collarbone. "God, Mac, that looks painful. Did you take anything?"

"Couple of Advil, I'm okay," she says, pointing to the chair in the corner where the phone charger sits, her attention pulled back to her screen when an email notification pops up.

_Thank God you're alright, I can't even tell you what I was thinking, the things I was imagining. Fuck, Mackenzie, I was so, so worried, and I meant everything I said in my last email. I'm sorry, sorry I wouldn't listen, sorry I didn't shake myself out of my stubbornness until I thought I might have lost you. I miss you, I...fuck, your internet signal's decent now, right?_

Momentarily thrown by the abrupt end to his message, she types back to say yes, her signal is perfectly fine, in case he's failed to notice they're managing to email quite successfully. His reply comes back almost instantly.

_Okay, good. Can we talk? I'm going to Skype you, I need to see your face, I can't say everything I need to in an email. Hang on..._

"Oh, holy shit," she says, panicking suddenly, running a hand through her still damp hair and looking over at Jim. "Jim, do I look okay?"

"Um..." He pauses, shrugging a worried look on his face. "Can I say no?"

"I'd rather you didn't, but fuck, it's a bit late now," she says, sighing as she resigns herself to the fact she has no time to do anything about how she currently looks, also aware deep down that he’s not going to care about what her hair looks like or that she’s not wearing a scrap of make-up.. "He wants to talk, he-"

She stops as a ringing noise begins, the box on her screen telling her she has an incoming Skype call, and she watches as Jim stands up, his foot tangling in the charger wire as he tries sweetly to exit the room before she answers the call. He doesn't quite manage it, and she feels his curiosity pique as she lets out a breath and hits the accept button, no longer caring that he's still standing here as Will's face appears on the screen.

"Billy..." She feels a smile spreading slowly across her lips as the blue eyes she's missed so painfully land on hers. There's a brief second of silence as they both just look at each other, before she speaks again. "I know I look like shit, but if you will spring a Skype call on me with no warning, there's not much-"

"You look tired, but...you’re beautiful, Mackenzie," he says, frowning slightly as his eyes flick over her shoulder. "I'm guessing that's Jim?"

"Yeah, he’s just leaving. Jim, come and say hi and then get the hell out, would you?" She throws the words over her shoulder but doesn't take her eyes off Will, unable to believe he's in front of her after so long.

"Um, hey, I’m about to get out of here," Jim says, hovering behind her awkwardly, giving a half wave in Will's direction. "Wait, you’re...? Never mind."

"Alright," she says, breaking eye contact with Will just long enough to turn to Jim. "You can absolutely leave now."

"Your _Billy_ is Will McAvoy?" Jim lowers his voice and turns so his back is to the screen, his eyes wide, surprised.

"William. Will. Billy. Jesus, Jim, how could you not realise?" She's genuinely amazed that he hadn't put two and two together, or that he did, but somehow came up with five. "Never mind, could you just..."

"Oh sure, send me out to dodge bullets so you can have some private time," Jim says, smirking as he picks up the charger and moves towards the door. "Don't mind me."

"Oh, put on a hard hat and a Kevlar vest, for fuck's sake!" She grins at him, sensing Will's gaze as he waits for her. "Or just, you know, go to your perfectly safe hotel room next door."

He gives another brief wave in Will's direction and leaves, closing the door firmly behind him.

"Fuck, I know you said he was young, but you didn't say CNN recruited him right out of high school." Will smiles at her, and she knows he's mostly teasing, even if he does genuinely seem to think anyone under thirty is a baby.

"He's twenty-four," she says, smiling back, wishing with everything she has that he could be in the room with her, not seven thousand miles away and behind a screen. "So...you missed me?"

"Present tense. You're not here so I _still_ miss you," he says quickly. "And when I thought there was a chance I might have lost you, I realised what a huge fucking idiot I'd been. So, if you still want me, if I haven't totally blown it...what you said in your email, when you come home I do want it to be to me. I love you, Mackenzie, I've loved you since pretty much the first day I met you, and you being gone, and knowing you're over there in the middle of God knows what has only made me more certain. If you'll let me, I want to spend the rest of my life showing you how much I love you, I-"

"That's all I want, it's all I've wanted all along. I love you too." She interrupts him, a bubble of pure happiness rising up inside her at his words. "I'll be home soon, and I'm not leaving again, I promise. Will you come and meet me at the airport?"

"Oh honey, try stopping me." His smile grows wider and for a few seconds they just grin stupidly at each other, recognising this for the big moment it is. She's going home and he's waiting there for her, just like she hoped he would be.

"Are they planning on letting that face of yours on TV tomorrow night?" he asks, keeping his tone light, but his frown giving him away.

"Well, that went sour pretty fast," she says with a smirk. "Two minutes ago I was beautiful."

"You know what I mean." He waves his hand in front of him, shrugging slightly, his eyes drifting slowly across her face and down her neck.

"I know,” she says quietly, smiling at him, again filled with relief that things are going to be okay. "They’re just bruises though, they look a lot worse than they are. They’ll be gone in a couple of days and I’ll be right as rain."

"I’m no doctor, Mac, but there’s no way in hell that kind of bruising will clear up in a couple of days," he says, sighing softly. "Not to mention whatever the hell else is out of shot there that I’m _not_ seeing."

"I'm okay." She gives up a silent prayer that he's wrong and her bruises will be all healed by the time she makes it home, but she suspects he's right, and she knows there's no way the cut on her arm will be gone by then. She's telling the truth though, she is okay, or she will be once she can touch him again, feel her hand in his, his lips on hers. "Really, I'm fine, and yes, in answer to your question, I'll be back on camera tomorrow. You can watch, count the bruises for yourself."

"I wish you were here," he says quickly, his vehemence taking her by surprise, not because she doubts him, just because it felt for a while like she might not hear that kind of declaration from him again.

"In New York?" she asks, realising that not only does she not have anywhere to live, Will is no longer in the city she used to call home.

"With me," he says quickly, running a hand through his hair. "Wherever, I just wish you were here with me, and not in some fucking hellhole where anything could happen-"

"I'm here for ten more days, Billy, that's all. Ten more days." She stops him, sensing his fear, his frustration, and she gives him a gentle smile. "Would it make sense for me to fly back into New York? It's not like I have anywhere to live so, you know, name your city and I'm there."

"Where's your stuff? In storage, in DC?" he asks, his brow creasing in thought, lifting slightly when she nods. "Then fly into Dulles, I'll come down."

"Okay. I'll let you know my flight details as soon as I have them," she says, the worry drifting slowly from his face as his eyes lock firmly onto hers and she tries to hold back a yawn.

"I should go, let you get some sleep," he says, smiling at her and sitting back slightly, his pale blue sweater catching her eye, the one she always loved most on him.

"Bored with me already? That doesn't bode well." She grins at him and his smile grows wider.

"Never," he says, shaking his head. "Not now, not twenty years from now, not fifty. I know you weren't serious, but I'm going to state this for the record anyway; I'm _never_ going to be bored with you, Mackenzie."

"Good, I was just testing." She grins again and realises she's smiled more in the last five minutes than in the last five months, and wonders if she ever would have managed to get over him if she'd been left with no choice. "And you're right. We're back on the road early and if I have any chance of looking halfway decent on camera tomorrow, I really should get some sleep. Have a good show tonight."

"Thanks, sleep well, honey," he says, and hearing him call her honey again sends a warmth running through her that she'd missed so desperately. "I love you."

"I love you too," she says, letting out a soft sigh as she wishes he were here so she could kiss him, curl up next to him, thankful that she'll be doing those things in less than two weeks.

"Be safe.” His eyes are soft and warm as he smiles. “I need you back here in one piece.”

“I’ll do my best.” She kisses the tip of her index finger and touches it gently against the screen before smiling and ending the call.

As she closes down her laptop, she thinks about the last five months, how different things have been here, how hard it's been to be away but also how fulfilling, if terrifying, the work has been. She thinks too about what she's going back to, so much of it unknown with Will now in New York, her apartment in DC gone, and no real idea what or where her next job might be, although CNN has made it clear they want to keep her so she at least doesn't need to worry about imminent unemployment. She's made a difference here, she's done some really good work, she knows that, but now she's ready to go home, ready to be with Will. Climbing into bed, she smiles and reminds herself she only has ten days to wait.


	8. Chapter 8

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _At the airport he can't sit because the waiting feels interminable, so he paces (no doubt driving everyone around him fucking crazy), checks his watch, stares obsessively at the arrivals board, finally sitting down only when the flight status changes to 'Landed', purely because his legs threaten to suddenly fail him._

It's been a long five months, but somehow the last ten days have felt the longest of all. Every night the first thing he does when he gets home after the show is watch her broadcast, drinking in the sight of her, watching as the brightness returns to her eyes (wondering if he has anything to do with it), seeing the bruise that coloured her cheekbone starting to fade, and noticing for the first time the light dusting of freckles across her nose. And then it comes time for her final report, her last sign off, and he knows the next time he sees her she'll be standing in front of him.

He doesn't sleep, but for the first time in months it's not due to despair or anger, it's because in a few hours he's going to be on his way to DC to meet her flight and he can't seem to do anything other than lie awake counting the minutes. He has a car courtesy of ACN, Charlie insisted, and he also has five nights off, again at Charlie's insistence, complete with the instruction to "spoil her, Will, it may have only been a few months, but she will have been through the mill, and seen things she's going to wish she hadn't...so yeah, take a few days with her."

His one condition was that they come back to New York on Friday and have lunch with him, and Will knows it's more than a casual chat, he's pretty sure there are plans afoot and he just hopes Mackenzie might be interested in working with him again if that's what Charlie intends to offer. In five months he's run through four EPs, and while he hasn't exactly been awful to them, he has probably made it quite clear that anyone who wasn't Mackenzie was never going to be good enough. Even if she _doesn't_ want to be his EP (he wouldn't blame her if she wanted to stay in front of the cameras considering she's damn good at it), she's coming home to be with him again, hopefully as his wife sooner rather than later, and as long as he has her to come home to after each show then maybe he can cope with whoever the hell his EP is.

He leaves early on Sunday morning and when they reach DC he asks the driver to stop at the hotel first so he can check in, make sure everything is perfect for when he brings her back. He knows a suite at the Four Seasons is extravagant, but when he thinks about where she's spent the last five months he doesn't doubt that it'll be worth every penny to make sure she's comfortable. He has no idea what she packed five months ago, but he made the assumption that most of her decent clothes are in storage and went shopping, bought her some jeans, boots, a shirt and sweater, just until they can get to the unit and collect her things. He bought something else too, and he feels a pang of nerves hit him as he closes his hand around the small velvet box before he slides it into his bag and stashes it at the bottom of the closet.

At the airport he can't sit because the waiting feels interminable, so he paces (no doubt driving everyone around him fucking crazy), checks his watch, stares obsessively at the arrivals board, finally sitting down only when the flight status changes to 'Landed', purely because his legs threaten to suddenly fail him. He takes several deep breaths, studiously ignoring the man sitting on the bench next to him who has either recognised him or thinks he's about to keel over, instead closing his eyes to regain his equilibrium. All logic seems to have deserted him and he suddenly can't remember how long it usually takes from landing to making it through security, but the last thing he wants to do is to not be standing right there when she appears, so he stands up and walks over to where he knows he won't miss her when she comes through.

Five minutes pass, maybe ten, he doesn't know, and then suddenly there she is, coming through the door, her eyes wide and prepared to seek him out, totally unnecessarily given that he's positioned himself where she couldn't possibly miss him. His heart leaps into his mouth and for a few seconds neither of them moves, almost as though they're both trying to process that yes, they really are standing right in front of each other, that she's home. He starts to move, to close the distance between them, but he feels too slow, too awkward. Then he remembers she's back because he told her he loves her, and because she loves him too, so he takes one more step and reaches for her. At the same time, she drops her bag and all but hurls herself at him, her arms winding around his neck as he lifts her off the ground and squeezes her almost _too_ tightly because he can't quite get enough of the feel of her back in his arms.

It hits him all over again how much he missed her, and how close he came to losing her, his stubbornness and unwillingness to listen rendering him incapable of rational thought even in the face of her decision to head to a war zone. He runs his hands up and down her back, not missing the bony feel of her spine under his fingers, her slightly more fragile frame obvious from the second he swept her off the ground.

"I love you, I'm sorry," he says, kissing the side of her head, breathing in her scent, so familiar but with a touch of the unknown. "I'm sorry."

He thinks she murmurs "me too" but her face is pressed so tightly into the side of his neck that her words are muffled and he can't be sure. She slides down his body and back onto her feet, looking up at him, and even though he can see the exhaustion in her eyes, it takes his breath away how beautiful she is. He cups her face in his hands and strokes his thumbs tenderly across her cheekbones, smiling as she blinks reflexively and bites her lip, a gesture he didn't realise he loved quite so much until this very moment. When his lips touch hers, her hands move to his waist, gripping his sweater as she opens her mouth, pulling him tighter against her. She tastes like everything he's missed, her lips as soft as ever, her skin warm under his fingertips, and when he pulls back, he sees a smile spread slowly across her lips, and he feels his own mouth curve in response.

"I'm sorry," she says, looking up at him, her eyes bright, the exhaustion suddenly diluted. "I'm really not sure I smell so great."

"I wouldn't care if you smelled like crap, honey." He shakes his head and feels like a huge weight has been lifted as he smiles at her. "But you don't. You smell like everything I've missed for the last five months."

"Sweat and really shitty detergent?" He feels her fingers moving against his waist, absently he thinks, and he can't resist leaning down to kiss her again, still yearning to relearn her taste.

"You smell like...my girl," he says, pulling back and pausing briefly before going on. "I know you're your own woman, strong and independent, and I fucking love that about you, but-"

"You're damn right, I'm all of those things." She stops him and leans in again, rubbing her nose against his and letting out a sigh. "But I can be your girl too."

"So..." He stops as he catches sight of Jim over her shoulder, shuffling awkwardly, running a hand through his hair, and feigning an unbelievable interest in the passport he holds in his hand. "Please tell me Jim has a place to stay tonight?”

"Well, I was thinking maybe..." She bites her lip and for a nanosecond he thinks she's serious, until she giggles and rolls her eyes. "I'm kidding, you idiot! Yes, he has a place to stay. Shit, do _we_ have a place to stay?"

"Don't worry about that, I have it covered," he says, sliding his hand down her arm and taking her hand, threading his fingers through hers and smiling at her.

"Um, I'll, um..." Jim speaks up, glancing at him, pointing in the vague direction of the baggage area. "I'll go ahead and get our bags, Mac, yeah?"

"Oh, sure, yeah." Mackenzie looks briefly over her shoulder, smiling at her young producer. "Thanks, Jim, we'll be right there."

"I can't believe you're home," he says as Jim disappears down the stairs, and he feels her fingers tangle more tightly in his.

"Well, you'd better believe it, Billy, because I'm right here," she says, smiling as she looks up at him and starts to tug on his hand, moving towards the stairs. "Let's get my bag and get out of here."

He stands back, her bag on his shoulder, watching as she hugs Jim, listening as she thanks him and tells him she'll be in touch soon. Enjoying the chance to observe for a few quiet moments, he notices how long her hair has grown, the messy ponytail tumbling down over her shoulders. She's definitely thinner, her shoulder blades pushing hard against her shirt, her cheekbones sharper and more defined than ever, and her pants hanging loose on her hips. A fresh pang of guilt hits him, accompanied by the need to get her home and take of care of her, to atone for his failure to stand up five months ago and beg her not to go. Her smile hasn't changed though, it still lights up her face, makes him want to smile with her, as he does now when she turns back to him, and reaches again for his hand.

"Alright, I'm going to head out, I, um..." Jim steps forward and holds out his hand, sending a tentative smile in his direction. "Good to meet you."

"You too." Nodding at Jim, he watches as he relaxes into his smile, and gives an impressively firm handshake before he turns to leave and Will feels Mackenzie squeeze his hand. "Seems like a good guy."

"He is," she says, firmly, leaning up to kiss him on the cheek. "Even if he is, you know, _twelve_." 

"Alright, I get it, he's eighteen or whatever," he says with a smirk. "You ready?"

"I'm ready." She smiles and they head for the exit.

She takes a deep breath when they step outside, and he feels her move closer to him, pushing herself against his side and curling her fingers further into his. He doesn't say anything, he knows she's tired, and that she'll need to adjust to being back home, but he squeezes her hand to let her know he's right there with her. When she starts to move to join the line for taxis, he diverts her to where the car and driver are waiting for them, smiling when she raises her eyebrows.

"Courtesy of ACN," he says, handing her bag to the driver with a nod of thanks. "Well, Charlie, actually."

"I can only imagine where we might be staying," she says with a smirk, climbing into the back of the car and settling back against the comfortable leather.

"That one's on me." He watches as she drops his hand to fasten her seatbelt, reaching for it as soon as she's done, clearly feeling the same way as him, not wanting to break contact for a minute. "You must be exhausted."

"Is that your way of gently saying I look rough? Because believe me, this is not news," she says, leaning back against the headrest but turning just enough to raise an eyebrow at him. "I just need to wash my hair, eat something, ravish the hell out of you, get some sleep, and I'll be fine."

"In that order?" he asks, running his thumb softly across her knuckle.

"Not necessarily..." She reaches for him, her hand resting on his chin and pulling him to her so she can kiss him, and it starts as a slow, tender kiss which quickly builds to something more intense, her tongue sliding against his, both of them left breathless when she pulls away. "The thing I'd like to put on the top of the list really wouldn't be appropriate for the back of this car."

"Yeah, they probably have rules about no food," he says, smirking as she lands a playful smack on his thigh.

"You got funny while I was away," she says, shifting so she can rest her head against his shoulder, falling silent so quickly that he wonders if she's asleep, startled when she speaks up again. "We should talk. About what happened before I left, about what I told you, and-"

"We don't need to talk about it." He stops her, but even as the words are out of his mouth he knows she's right, so he backtracks almost immediately. "No, we do, you're right, but...we can wait, we have plenty of time to talk, honey, it doesn't have to be right now."

"I know, but...I need to be sure that you've thought about it, processed it, if you like. I have to know that you can forgive me so we can move past it, and I'm just..." She pauses but he senses she's not finished, so he waits. "Not scared, but _worried_ , I guess, that you're so relieved that I'm okay and home, that maybe you haven't really-"

"Alright, let's talk about it." He squeezes her fingers, hoping it's enough to let her know he means it, that he's going to talk, not yell or get mad, and when she lifts her head to look at him he goes on. "I started seeing someone while you were gone, talking to someone, I mean. A therapist, because I know that my reaction to what you told me was about much more than just that, and he's been...fuck, I hate to say it, but he's been helpful."

"That's great, Will, really," she says, genuine surprise in her tone. "I'm glad it's helping."

"Yeah, he's kind of gotten to the crux of some stuff with me, I guess," he says, shrugging because even though he will talk to her about the therapy, he doesn't really want to do it now. "Anyway, go ahead, talk to me, honey."

"I want to start by saying there's nothing in my life I regret more than those few months. _Nothing_. I let myself be used by someone who wasn't...well, that doesn't matter, but I let him call the shots simply because he knew someone else might actually want to be with me and he hated that. So I was an idiot. He'd call, or show up, and I'd just...cave." She stops and frowns as she takes a deep breath and gives a shaky smile. "But then as soon as I knew that what we had, you and I, was more than casual, more than just dating, I realised what a complete fool I'd been and I never saw him again, I promise. I blocked his number, and his email, and I didn't give him another thought, until...well, until much later when I started to wonder if I should tell you, be honest, get everything out in the open. Then when I thought I might be pregnant, it seemed like the right thing to do, the only thing to do, and then you-"

"I flipped out," he says, stopping her, barely able to stand the sadness in her eyes. "Refused to listen, shut you out."

"I don't blame you for that." She blinks back sudden tears and he wonders again if this really is the right time to be talking about this, when she's been travelling for more than a day, she's beyond tired, and they're both emotional, but they've started now so there's no going back. "I don't blame you at all, there's nobody to blame but me, I was-"  
"I refused to let you explain, I showed up at your door with your things thrown into a suitcase, and then I ran off to New York," he says, feeling slightly sick at hearing it out loud for the first time since he laid out his behaviour to his therapist. "Even when you called to say you were going overseas, to fucking Afghanistan, Mackenzie, and I was terrified, I still couldn't swallow my pride. That's unforgivable."

"Well, it clearly _isn't_ unforgivable, is it?" She wipes her eyes and looks at him, her voice strong and her hand holding tightly to his. "Because I'm here, with you. I came back because I want to be with you, because I love you. I know we talked on Skype, but it's different somehow, and now that I'm back, now we're sitting right next to each other, I just really need to hear that what I did isn't completely unforgivable either."

"You made a mistake, way back when we were a new thing, and then you fixed it, you quit making that mistake because things changed between us, became _more_ , so really, there's nothing for me to forgive," he says, knowing as he says the words how much he tried to hang onto his blame for her, only to realise that even though what she did was questionable, she never did it with the intention of hurting him. "I love you Mackenzie, I want to be with you, and nothing changes that. Does that...clear things up for you?"

"Yes." She nods and he watches the sadness in her eyes clear, replaced by a soft smile. "It does, and I...I want to be with you too. You know, in case _I_ wasn't clear."

"Imagine if we'd had this conversation without you having to disappear to a war zone and me having to spend a fucking fortune on therapy, huh?" He smiles when she gives a small huff of laughter.

"Yeah, imagine that," she murmurs, looking at him with such relief, such complete love that he can do nothing more than smile back at her. "Better late than never though, right?"

"Right." He lifts their joined hands and kisses his way slowly across her knuckles.

She sighs and leans her head against his shoulder again, and this time when she falls silent and he hears her breathing change, he knows she is sleeping, so he kisses the top of her head and lets her rest.


	9. Chapter 9

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _"The Four Seasons?" She looks down quickly at what she's wearing; combats, a button down shirt, and a jacket in real and desperate need of a wash, and she sighs as she lets him move her towards the lobby, thankful when they bypass the main desk and head straight for the elevators._

He wakes her when they reach the hotel, nudging her gently, murmuring her name as he squeezes her fingers. She's awake instantly, blinking as she tries to get her bearings, to remember where she is. She's never been one who wakes up gradually, always like she's been shot out of a canon, ready for the day as soon as she opens her eyes, and she doubts it's a trait that will have lessened while she was somewhere with potential risk in every passing minute. It takes her a few seconds but when she glances out of the window and realises where they are, her eyes go wide and she grabs Will's hand, waiting as the driver takes her bag and hands it over.

"The Four Seasons?" She looks down quickly at what she's wearing; combats, a button down shirt, and a jacket in real and desperate need of a wash, and she sighs as she lets him move her towards the lobby, thankful when they bypass the main desk and head straight for the elevators.

"Five nights," he says, pushing the button and turning to her. "Time for you to relax, for us to spend some real time together. If that's okay with you, of course."

"Shit, Will, it's more than okay. I would have been happy anywhere with a nice bed and a really good shower, but this is perfect." She can't help the grin spreading across her face at the thought of a few days here, just the two of them together after so long apart. "You checked in already?"

"Yeah, I dropped off my bag earlier, I wanted to make sure it was all ready for you," he says with a smile, shrugging faintly even though she knows he's pleased with her reaction, as he has every right to be.

The elevator comes to a stop and he waits as she steps out, following her, her bag slung over his shoulder, and he hands her the card to open the door. As she steps inside, she realises instantly that he hasn't just booked them a room, he's booked a whole suite, and she turns to him as he closes the door, a smile on her face so wide her cheeks start to ache.

"I love you, Will McAvoy," she says, stepping towards him and moving up onto her toes to kiss him. "I really love you."

Grabbing his hand, she walks into the living area, noting the huge, plush couch, the TV on the wall, and the huge windows overlooking the city she's been missing, realising at the same time that it's probably no longer the city she'll be calling home. Still pulling him behind her, she peeks her head into the bathroom, sighing happily at the pile of huge fluffy towels stacked up beside the impressive bathtub, before tugging him into the bedroom, stopping at the end of the bed.

"Are you quite done with your tour?" He looks amused and she shrugs, aware that she has just dragged him around the suite like a kid in a toy shop but not even slightly embarrassed.

"I'm done," she says, stepping forward and snuggling into his chest, smiling when he slides his arms around her and drops a kiss to the top of her head as they stand in silence.

"So...are you hungry? Do you want to sleep? Take a shower?" he asks, his hold on her loosening as he leans down to look into her eyes. "Whatever you want to do, honey."

"Do you not think I ended this tour in the bedroom for a reason?" She looks up at him, her hand reaching for his, tangling their fingers together, knowing the second he realises what she wants, a smile tugging at his lips. "I mean, I know it's been a few months, but damn, I thought I still had it."

"Oh, you do," he says quickly, not objecting when she grabs a fistful of his sweater and pulls him closer to her.

"I missed you," she murmurs softly against his cheek before she kisses him, sliding a hand under his sweater, grinning when he squirms in surprise. She runs her tongue slowly across his top lip, just in case he was still in any doubt of her intentions. "I don't want a shower, or dinner...not right now, anyway. All I want right now is you, Will."

She must make it clear because before she knows what's happening he steers her to sit down on the end of the bed and kneels down in front of her, looking up, his eyes dark and hungry. His hands move to remove her boots, quickly untying the laces and pulling them off, socks too, and she tries not to think about what state her feet are in. However bad she fears they may be, he seems to disagree because she feels his fingers running softly up her foot to caress her ankle bone and she hears herself let out a moan in response to his touch. Raising himself up he leans in and kisses her, and her hands reach automatically for his shoulders, his muscles feeling strong under her fingers. She feels him opening the buttons on her pants, slowly, almost agonisingly so, when all she wants is for him to rip them off her so she can feel his hands on her skin.

Settling back on her elbows she tilts her hips and he slides her pants off and tosses them to the floor, his fingers roaming down her thighs, gently over her knees, relearning the map of her body, she thinks. She hears his sharp intake of breath as his fingers stop moving, resting on her shins. The scars have faded, and she knows they'll be gone completely soon enough, but for now they're a reminder of where she's been, what she's been through. She wonders too about the memories, how quickly they might fade and how thoroughly, and she gives thanks again that they were no closer to the blast that day, and that Jim spotted the knife blade when he did a few weeks later. Realising he's gone quiet, she sits up and sees him gazing at her legs, a frown creasing his forehead and worry written across his face.

"They're not so bad, and they'll fade soon enough," she says, smiling at him when he looks up at her. "It could have been much worse, so much worse. Let's just be thankful it wasn't, okay?"

"Yeah, I know, I just..." He closes his eyes for a second, his thumbs starting to move again, stroking so tenderly over her skin that it brings a lump to her throat. "Fuck, it could have been so-"

"Stop it," she says, more sharply than she intended, watching as his eyebrows raise in surprise at her tone. "I'm alright, I promise. They're really just scrapes, and if I can ignore them, surely you can too?"

"I'm not going to...I can't ignore them, but I can try to stop completely freaking out. Will that do?" He lets out a shaky breath and she reaches for him, waiting as he gets off his knees and moves to sit on the bed beside her.

"I'll take that, yeah." She shifts her hands to his sweater, the waistband of his jeans, because she wants him undressed but she doesn't know where to begin. So she gives up trying and leans in, kissing him before pulling back and smirking at him. "Take your clothes off, Billy."

He pulls the sweater over his hand, and hurls it across the room (further than necessary, but she applauds his enthusiasm), and when he stands up to take off his jeans, she feels everything hitting her at once and she has to catch her breath. She's home, it isn't over, he still loves her, she still loves him, it's going to be okay. Her scars will fade, so will his guilt, and if it takes a while for her memories to fade then at least she can start making new ones, happier ones, with him. He's standing in front of her in only his shorts and she wants him so badly it hurts, an actual physical ache, a throbbing yearning that seems to start in her toes and move slowly, determinedly up her body. Throwing her shirt in the vague direction of his sweater, she moves back up the bed and settles against the pillows, her eyes fixed on his, waiting for him to make his move. She watches as his eyes travel down her body, lingering on her neck, her collarbone (a frown threatens his face when he glimpses her bruises but he manages to control it), down to her chest, where his gaze stops. Stupidly, she feels embarrassed that she's not wearing a better bra, that her panties don't match, and it's followed by a wave of self-consciousness. She knows she's still looking slightly beaten up, her skin is dryer than it's been in a long time, and she's thinner than she'd like to be, her ribs too visible, her hipbones too jagged. Biting her lip, she shifts slightly, fighting a sudden, ridiculous urge to climb under the bedding and hide herself, but when he flicks his eyes back up to hers, she sees none of the judgements she's making about herself, she just sees how much he wants her and she lets out a relieved breath.

He stretches out on the bed beside her and she turns to face him, smiling when his hand slides under her bra strap and pushes it down her shoulder before moving to the cream lace cup (was it always cream, or did it start off white? She's not sure) and running his thumb across the fabric. She feels her nipple peak under his touch instantly, and automatically she pushes against him, craving his touch. Pushing the cup down, he reaches for her nipple, circling gently at first with his finger, adding his thumb when she moans her appreciation, and she feels a jolt of arousal rush through her body, finds herself squirming to cope with the ache between her legs. When he dips his head and captures her nipple in his mouth, his tongue swirling over the puckered skin, she pushes one hand roughly into his hair and the other into her panties. He murmurs her name against her skin and starts to suck harder, encouraged by her moans, and she's barely aware of his hand pushing hers aside until she feels his fingers replacing her own, rubbing through her wetness as his tongue keeps moving against her breast. After five months, the sensations are almost too much, the feel of his fingers on her, his mouth, the talented tongue she's missed so very much, and when his teeth scrape over her nipple the orgasm that hits her unexpectedly is so powerful that she lets out a sound she didn't know she could make, squeezing her eyes tightly shut as the shocks ripple through her.

His mouth stays on her breast, planting soft kisses on her skin as his hand slides slowly out of her panties, and when she opens her eyes she's greeted with the sight of his fingers, sticky with her wetness, slipping into his mouth. It's a sight that threatens to make her come again, the ache between her legs building, the need to feel him inside her almost overwhelming. Cupping his face in her hands, she lays back and pulls him to her, feeling him hard against her thigh and sliding her tongue into his mouth. His hands move underneath her and his fingers are warm and gentle on her back, roaming up her spine before he pulls his lips from hers down to her neck, sucking softly on the skin below her ear, making her moan his name, loud and clear in the quiet hotel room.

Reaching down, her hand makes its way into his shorts and takes hold of him, and she's not surprised at how hard he is, how ready. Clumsily she attempts to drag his shorts off, but it proves impossible in their current position so she sighs and lets him roll onto his back so he can pull them down his legs. There's nothing hiding his readiness now, and she instinctively opens her legs in anticipation. God, she's missed him, and it isn't that she'd forgotten how blessed he is in this area (and by default how lucky she is too), more that she hadn't quite allowed herself to hope for this again.

"Can I say something?" His voice sounds strained and his eyes are dark again as he leans in to kiss her.

"Not while your tongue is in my mouth," she says, smirking as they pull apart, pausing as he unhooks her bra finally and she shrugs out of it. "But yeah, go on. What?"

"All I want right now is to be inside you, but I can't promise it won't be over in seconds as soon as I am," he says, a small sheepish smile flickering across his lips. "Just putting it out there."

"I get it," she says, knowing she's being slightly cruel when she reaches down and wraps her hand around his hard length, but unable to resist, grinning at him. "Despite my bruises and the obvious fact that I'm in some serious need of leg hair removal, I'm an irresistible hottie, I know that."

She pulls her panties down her legs, looking at him as she dangles them from one foot, waiting for him to grab them and toss them to the floor, giggling when he does. His hands run down her sides, his fingers tickling her ribs, his thumbs rubbing across her abdomen and settling on her hipbones.

"You're beautiful, no question..." He pauses, leaning down to kiss her stomach, his breath hot on her skin, the hunger in his eyes unmistakable as he looks up at her. "But when we're done here, you're going to eat the biggest fucking dinner, I swear to God. If you want to order one of every damn thing on the room service menu, that's what we'll do."

She nods, swallowing down the lump in her throat, recognising his words for exactly what they are, concern for how much weight she lost while she was away, and a need to see her healthier again, nothing other than that because she knows he still thinks she's beautiful, and she loves him for that. Tilting her hips and reaching for his shoulders, she lets him know she's ready, that she wants him right now, and when he nudges at her entrance she runs her nails across her skin, moaning with pure release as he slides slowly inside her.

His hands rest on the bed on either side of her face and his eyes lock onto hers, dark and intense, as he starts to move. She lifts one leg, hooking it around his thigh, curling her toes into his skin when she feels him push deeper into her, her eyes fluttering shut in response and a moan escaping her. Her hands tighten their grip on his shoulders and she feels him speed up as he lets out a groan and sinks down onto his forearms so his lips can capture hers. She nibbles gently on his bottom lip, reclaiming him, savouring the taste she missed while she was gone, and when he slides his tongue against hers she squeezes her muscles around him and feels him grow even harder inside her. Pulling back, he raises himself up slightly onto one arm, his other hand cupping her face, his eyes fixed on hers, shining in a combination of bliss and exertion.

"God, Mackenzie, I love you." His words are simple, sincere, and she smiles up at him as he keeps moving inside her, slowing down in the way she remembers he always does when he's close.

Her hands wind around the back of his neck, into his hair, pulling him closer, her face snuggling against the warm skin under his chin, her mouth open slightly to breathe, to taste him. She senses him trying to hold back and she runs her tongue across his neck, feeling his gasp as he again pushes harder inside her.

“You can come, Billy,” she murmurs, digging her fingertips into his shoulder, lifting her leg slightly higher to pull him even deeper. “I mean, shit, you barely had to touch me and it was all over. And I've missed it…I’ve missed the feel of you coming inside me.”

She’s fairly sure of how her words will affect him, and she’s proved right when he groans her name, long and low, his movements slowing and his breath hitching. She scrapes her teeth across his neck, following with another swipe of her tongue, and it's all he needs to send him over the edge. Shuddering, he sighs and pushes into her with one final stroke before he comes with her name falling from his lips, followed by a silence broken only by the sounds of their satisfied breaths. When he slides slowly out of her, she feels an inexplicable need to cling to him, relieved when he rolls onto his back and gladly pulls her with him, stroking a hand through her hair as she snuggles against his chest. She's tired, hungry, and desperately in need of a wash, but right now she's so comfortable she can't bring herself to move, even though she knows she really should use the bathroom. His fingers gently massage her scalp and she runs her hand through the light dusting of hair on his chest, her nails trailing down his skin as she breathes a sigh of pure contentment.

"Don't let me fall asleep," she mumbles, smiling because she knows if she waits even a couple of minutes he'll be asleep anyway so keeping her awake will be impossible. "I need to pee, and get clean."

"And eat," he says, running his hand down her back. "You're going to eat a huge dinner, remember?"

"Mmm-hmm, I remember," she says, sliding her foot in between his legs, suddenly feeling the chill in the room that she hadn't noticed when she was preoccupied, when his body on top of hers was provided all the warmth she needed. "But first, bathroom."

She kisses him before peeling herself off his chest and squeezing his hand, sliding down to the end of the bed, feeling his gaze on her as she does, knowing if she turned back he would be looking at her with unashamed adoration. Standing up (on slightly shaky legs), she can't resist a glance in his direction, and she's right, the look in his eyes is everything she missed, everything she came home for, and as she heads for the bathroom it's with a huge smile on her face.


	10. Chapter 10

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _The mirror is fairly forgiving (the blessings of a nice hotel), but still, she sees the dark circles clouding her face along with the fading bruises, but this time there's a happiness behind her eyes that she hasn't seen for a while, and it's a welcome sight._

The mirror is fairly forgiving (the blessings of a nice hotel), but still, she sees the dark circles clouding her face along with the fading bruises, but this time there's a happiness behind her eyes that she hasn't seen for a while, and it's a welcome sight. Washing her hands, her eyes land again of the pile of fluffy towels and suddenly all she wants is to shower, to stand under a reliably hot spray, and to finally wash her hair. Needing to find something clean to wear when she's done, she heads back into the bedroom, pausing as she realises her bag isn't there, thinking he probably left it in the living area.

"You okay?" His voice surprises her, his head lifting from the pillow, a smile on his face. "Yeah, I'm just..." She smiles back at him, the urge to climb back into bed beside him almost beating her longing for a shower, but not quite. "I'm going to take a shower, I just need to find my bag."

"I'll come with you," he says, sitting up and running his hand through his messy hair.

"I think I can make it to the other room, Billy," she says, gesturing towards the door and smiling again.

"I meant that I'd come take a shower with you." His eyes sweep down her body as if seeing her for the first time, and she feels a blush colour her cheeks. "Unless you don't-"

"Oh...I'd love that." She waits as he climbs out of bed, holding her hand out to him as he reaches her. "Plus, it would mean I don't have to wash my own hair, which sounds so unbelievably good right about now."

Forgetting about her bag, about clean clothes, she takes his hand and heads back to the bathroom, the two of them padding across the thick, soft carpet of the bedroom, her fingers tangled tightly in his. Her hair has mostly escaped its ponytail so she slides the band out and drops it beside the sink before reaching in to turn on the shower, about to step in when she feels his hand slide under her hair, tickling the back of her neck.

"Your hair got so long," he says, moving his other hand to push it back from her eyes when she turns to him.

"I know." She nods, smiling at him as he tucks a stray piece behind her ear. "I feel like it grows faster out of pure spite when it's being neglected and forced into a ponytail day after day."

"Well, I like it." He shrugs and opens the shower door, letting her step in ahead of him, probably sensing her longing to get under the hot, strong spray.

"I might like it again too once it feels clean," she says, closing her eyes and letting out a sigh of appreciation as the water hits her.

She stands still, just letting the hot, welcome water cascade over her, through her hair, down her back, and she feels him step closer behind her, his hands moving to her shoulders, his thumbs starting to firmly massage her knotted muscles. God, he was always good at this, and she needs it now more than ever.

"Would you wash my hair?" she asks, recalling how Jim awkwardly did it for her when her wrist was broken and she simply couldn't manage it herself.

He doesn't answer but his thumbs press one final time against her shoulders before he reaches for the shampoo on the wall, squirting a decent sized blob into his hand and rubbing it between his palms. She tilts her head back slightly and closes her eyes again, smiling as his fingers move into her hair, massaging gently at first, his fingertips soft against her scalp before he ups the pressure and her head starts to tingle. It feels just like she remembers, his fingers reminding her of countless Sunday morning showers at his apartment, and she sighs at the thought.

"You alright?" His hands still and there's concern in his voice.

"Don't stop, I'm fine," she says, answering quickly and leaning back against him a fraction more. "You're so good at this...I've missed it. Having Jim wash my hair was a considerably different experience."

"Jim?" He stops and she turns, grinning at his baffled expression.

"When my wrist was broken," she says, clarifying, watching realisation dawn on his face. "Poor Jim had to wash my hair over a sink in a shitty hotel bathroom. His hair washing skills have a long way to go to match yours, Billy. I actually think he'd have looked less uncomfortable if I'd asked him to suck my toes. Which I didn't, obviously."

"Good to know," he says, smiling at her as his hands start to move again.

She feels his fingers massage the last of the shampoo out before starting to work the conditioner through to the ends of her hair, gently untangling the knots before running his hands down her back, sending a shiver running through her despite the hot water. Turning back to face him, she steps closer and slides her arms around him, moving them out of the full hit of the spray as she leans in and places a kiss on his chest, her tongue running slowly up his skin. Looking up at him, she smiles, reacquainting herself with feeling happy, relaxing into it after months of preparing for the complete opposite. He leans down and kisses her, his thumbs rubbing in soft strokes across her cheekbones as his lips cover hers and she sighs into him. She opens her eyes when he pulls away and looks up to see him gazing at her, an expression on his face she can't quite read.

"I was so...God, honey..." He pauses, his thumbs still moving gently in small circles over her cheekbones. "Please don't leave again."

"You left first," she murmurs, giving him a faint smile. "I know why, obviously, but you were gone and on the air in New York before I’d even considered that leaving DC might be an option. You said you needed space but I don’t think I realised you meant a thousand miles-"

"New York is two _hundred_ or so miles from DC," he says, aiming for a teasing smile, but it fails to reach his eyes. "Not the point, I know."

"It’s okay, we talked about this, I’m not trying to pick a fight, I promise, I’m…" She sighs and steps back under the spray, needing to rinse her hair. "I’m not planning on going anywhere. I mean, shit, I wasn’t exactly planning on going to Afghanistan, it just seemed like-"

"A good opportunity to get back on camera, do some really great work, combined with a solid attempt to punish the idiot who ran off to New York when he should have stayed and listened to you?" He looks sheepish, watching her as she leans her head back to drain away the last of the conditioner, a faint smile moving onto his lips when she reaches for his hand and squeezes.

"Maybe…" She bites her lip as she looks up at him, a smile sneaking past it. "It seemed to work on both counts though, so…"

"Oh, it worked...you impressed the shit out of me over there. And almost as soon as you left I knew I'd been a fucking idiot. Pulling my head out of my ass took a bit longer," he says, tangling his fingers tighter in hers and tugging her towards him.

"You got there eventually. Slow and steady wins the race," she says, turning the shower off, her stomach rumbling loudly without the sound of the water to mask it. "Although I've never been convinced that saying makes any sense."

"What do you say we get out of here and eat some dinner?" He smiles as she nods, stepping out and knotting a towel around his waist, holding one out in front of him and wrapping it around her, the soft cotton feeling exactly as comforting as she hoped it would. "You know what's great about this hotel?"

"Everything." She answers quickly, taking the smaller towel he offers, squeezing the excess water from her hair and roughly towel drying it until she can work up to dragging a comb through it. "I'm serious. Everything about this hotel is great, I'm genuinely considering suggesting we just live here. You could do your show from the living room, I could spend my days in that shower...sounds like heaven to me."

"All of that's true, but what I was actually thinking about were the huge fluffy robes in the closet out there." He nods in the direction of the door, smiles and kisses her, ignoring the look she's giving him as she wonders why he's quite so excited about bathrobes. "Don't move, I'm going to grab them, I'll be right back."

He's out of the bathroom almost before he's finished his sentence so she lets him go and turns to the mirror, thankful it's still partly obscured by steam, stepping closer to peer at herself, frowning at the sight before her. She has a light smattering of freckles across her forehead, her nose, giving the illusion of a hint of colour, and she dreads to think how bad she might look without it. As it is, the circles under her eyes are all too prominent, there's a small bruise on her chin, and her eyebrows are in serious need of attention (clearly not the most concerning thing on her list, but still, she can't help noticing). There's something in her eyes that gives her hope though, a light she hadn't seen for the past few months, a spark that reminds her she's home, she's okay, and it's a thought that brings a lump to her throat. God, she needs some decent sleep, even if it's just so she can stop wanting to cry so fucking often.

Wiping her eyes, she reaches for a small bottle of lotion beside the sink, moisturiser as she hoped, and rubs a generous amount into her hands before smoothing it across her face, her parched skin grasping desperately at it. The door opens and he reappears, wearing what she admits is probably the most comfortable robe she's ever seen and holding out another one for her. She gladly drop her towel and slides her arms into the robe, smiling as he knots the belt before reaching for her hand and moving them both back into the bedroom. He hands her the room service menu and she stands at end of the bed, glancing at it, suddenly overwhelmed by choice when really all she wants is a burger, a huge bottle of water, and some M&Ms. Handing it back, she shrugs and slides her hands into the pockets of the robe, smiling up at him.

"Do you think this menu is exhaustive?" she asks, watching as he runs a hand through his hair, the way he does when he's nervous, oddly. "I mean, what I really want is...wait, what's...?"

There's something in the pocket of her robe, and in the instant she realises what it is, or what it could be, she also wonders if that explains his sudden nerves. Lifting it out, she sees it properly, a small velvet box, and her eyes widen as she looks at him and sinks down to sit on the bed, her legs suddenly not quite doing their job. Taking the box gently out of her hand, he kneels down in front of her and it's clear that he intends to do this properly, down on one knee and all, and it's so ridiculously sweet that she can't help the grin that spreads across her face. He fumbles slightly but opens the box and takes a breath.

"I love you, Mackenzie Morgan McHale, and I never, _ever_ want to be without you again, so if this isn't the worst idea you've ever heard..." He pauses and takes the ring out of the box, a slight tremble evident in his hand that just adds to how perfect a moment this is. "Will you marry me?"

"What? I...yes. Yes! God, _yes_." She answers without hesitation, nodding, unable to take her eyes off his, fixed firmly on hers, all traces of nerves sliding away as she keeps nodding, smiling widely at him.

"Thank God," he says, relief colouring his tone as he reaches for her hand and slides the ring slowly onto her finger.

Not only is it beautiful, and the exact design she would have chosen for herself, more surprisingly it fits perfectly, which she suspects must be down to something more than sheer luck. She stares at the diamond for a few seconds longer and then shifts her gaze back to him, smiling again as he reaches for her, cups her face gently and kisses her. She's missed him so much, and now she doesn't have to worry about that again, she's wearing his ring, he wants to marry her, and she wants that too, and soon.

"I love it," she says as she pulls back, stroking her thumb over the ring, sighing as it glistens. "It's exactly what I would have chosen."

"I know that," he says with a shrug, continuing when she raises her eyebrows. "You don't remember? We talked about it once and you described a ring you saw in a movie once that you liked."

"Oh! I do remember." She recalls the conversation, triggered by a news segment on diamond mining, when a vivid image of the ring she liked had popped into her head and she had felt the need to describe it to him. "I just didn't expect you to remember."

"I like to pretend I'm not listening to these things when I'm actually storing them up for future reference." He moves off the floor and onto the bed beside her as another question hits her.

"Did we have a conversation once about sizing too?" she asks, surprised when a hint of embarrassment crosses his face and he smiles slightly nervously again.

"No, for that one I had help," he says, pausing to tuck her hair behind her ear. "I, um, I called your mom and told her I'd seen a ring I thought you'd like, and that I was looking for a welcome home gift-"

"Right, like my mother would have fallen for that for a second!" She stops him with a grin, knowing her mother better than that.

"Yeah." He nods, returning her grin. "I think she said something along the lines of 'oh Will, I think we both know that's not entirely true', then she told me your size and wished me luck."

"We should call them," she says, and it takes her a minute to calculate what time it is in DC, let alone in London, a yawn escaping her as she finally figures it out. "Not now, obviously, but in the morning."

"You're tired, honey." It's not a question, she gets that her tiredness is a given at this point, so she just nods in response. "Eat and then sleep?"

"As long as I can have a burger, a bag of M&Ms, and some water, I'll be happy." She yawns again, briefly wondering how bad it would be for her digestive system if she were to end up asleep almost as soon as she were to finish chewing.

She gets her burger, her M&Ms, and her water, and because she leaves Will to order while she dries her hair, they also end up with champagne, salad, enough fries for about four people, and a huge fruit platter ("so you have something to snack on if you wake up hungry in the middle of the night"). She manages more than she thought she would, and despite scoffing at the selection of M&Ms flavours he somehow got delivered, she makes a decent attempt at all three bags. The entire feast is washed down with enough champagne to remind her of how little she's been drinking in recent months, and by the time she finishes her last glass she can barely keep her eyes open, and she doesn't even try to keep the grin off her face.

She's consumed by a tiredness so deep she can feel it in her toes, deep in her gut, but for the first time in so long it comes with the knowledge that she's going to be sleeping with Will, that if she wakes up in the dark he'll be there, just as he will when daylight wakes them both. Stumbling to the bathroom she brushes her teeth and watches him in the mirror beside her as he does the same, appreciating the chance to look at him again, to know she can look at him whenever she likes now, smiling when he catches her eye.

When he's done he takes her hand and leads her back into the bedroom, pulling back the covers and climbing in first, moving over to his usual side of the bed, and as he turns onto his side she knows he's waiting for her decide how much or how little contact she wants tonight. It's inherent, his sweetness, and it's one of the things she loves about him, how he's so considerate and kind, just because he is. If he's expecting her to need space tonight, he's going to be surprised because it's absolutely the last thing she wants. For months she's been dreaming about being with him again, sharing a bed with him, absorbing the heat from his body as he sleeps, and feeling his chest rise and fall softly under her cheek. Climbing into bed next to him, she pushes herself against his chest, her arms wrapping around him, her legs tangling with his, and tucking her head under his chin.

"I love you." Her words are slurred with exhaustion and she hears his murmured response, feels his hand on the back of her neck as she drifts quietly into sleep.

She sleeps more soundly than she can remember doing in months, not even the painkillers the medics gave her after they reset her wrist helped her sleep the way having Will beside her does. He's warm next to her, his hand resting on her stomach, and when she shifts slightly and eventually adjusts her eyes to the darkness she can see him sleeping, his expression peaceful, his breathing slow and comforting. She doesn't know what time it is but it's definitely too early to wake him, even though she know her body clock seems to have decided it's time for her to be awake. Covering his hand with hers, she lifts his arm and slides carefully out of bed, scooping up the bathrobe she'd discarded earlier and heading out of the bedroom.

Flicking on the lamp in the corner of the living room, she ponders coffee before deciding tea is probably a better option at five in the morning. There's an almost absurdly wide selection of tea so it takes a moment of staring at the choices before she finally settles on peppermint, picking up the cup and curling up in the corner of the plush couch. It's still a couple of hours from sunrise, yet there are lights on in the various buildings she can see from where she's sitting, early risers beginning their days, night owls perhaps just ending theirs. There's something optimistic about the early morning, she's always loved the feeling of being awake before the majority of the city, the energy that comes with the start of a new day. She knows Will doesn't feel the same, he's really not a morning person, and she smiles as she thinks about how grumpy he gets when he's dragged from sleep earlier than he'd like to be. She can usually talk him around, there are certain things he can't resist, even at dawn, and she's not above using her charms when necessary. If it raises a smile (amongst other things...), it's worth it.

Standing up she walks over to the window, gazing out at the view, the street lights, the pockets of activity dotted around in stark contrast to the last five months, to the nights where she found herself counting stars just to remind herself that she wasn't in total darkness. She lets out a long sigh and wraps her hands around her cup, the warmth and the scent of the peppermint combining to calm her thoughts. She looks down at her hand, at the ring on her finger, and she thinks about how different everything is from just a couple of days ago and even more so from a couple of weeks ago when she didn't even know if Will would still be waiting for her, let alone wanting to marry her.

"You know it's...five seventeen in the morning, right?" His voice startles her slightly, even though part of her wondered if he might wake up and question where she was sooner rather than later.

"Meaning it's two forty-seven in the afternoon in Kabul," she says, smiling as she feels his hands on her shoulders. "And in my brain, annoyingly."

"Did you sleep at all?" he asks, his fingers rubbing across the cloth of the robe she's wearing.

"Mmm, I did. Better than I have in months," she says, taking a sip from her cup and leaning back against his bare chest as she feels his hands leave her shoulders and his arms slide around her middle. "I was just realising how much I'd missed the lights of the city. It was so dark where we were for most of the time, really, thoroughly dark. I'd forgotten how it's never really completely _dark_ here, even at this time."

"You hate the dark," he says simply, and his fingers curl tightly into her robe, loosening slightly when she covers his hand with her own, falling into silence as she lets his touch relax her.

"So...did you put a ring on my finger so I wouldn't put up an argument about moving to New York?" She takes another sip of her tea before reaching forward to put it down so she can turn to him, looking up at him, a teasing smile on her face.

"I put a ring on your finger because I love you," he says with a shrug. "You can totally raise a protest about New York if DC is where you want to be."

"It's not." She realises she doesn't really care where she is as long as she can be with him and do the job she loves, and there's no reason why that can't happen in New York. "You're happy in New York, right?"

"Until about eleven days ago, I wasn't happy at all, wouldn't have mattered where I was." He smiles at her and she understands what he's saying, it's the same reason she went to Afghanistan. She wasn't going to be happy anywhere without him so she may as well be in the middle of a war zone.

"But now you're back, and thank God you still want to be with me, I really don't..." He pauses, sighs lightly. "I mean, the job is good, ACN is where I started, it was Charlie who gave me my first real break, and I-"

"Alright, I guess I should make some calls and see if there's anything for me in New York." She stops him, smiling and taking his hand. "Can I assume there's room for me in your swanky Manhattan bachelor pad?"

"As much as my swanky one bedroom walk-up would love to have you, how about we look for somewhere new together?" he says, returning her smile. "Somewhere bigger, with a second bedroom, a nicer bathroom, and a closet that won't make you cry at how small it is. Consider that a warning, by the way."

"Consider me warned." She grins and squeezes his hand, a sudden yawn surprising her. "We don't have plans for today, do we?"

"Nope." He shakes his head and tangles his fingers more tightly in hers.

"Good." She leans up and kisses him, her tongue nudging his, her free hand moving to his waist, roaming slowly over his warm skin as she drags her lips from his. "So if we wanted to go back to bed and stay there all day, we totally could?"

"Honey, you have five months worth of shitty sleep to catch up on," he says, running the backs of his fingers softly across her cheek, her eyes fluttering shut in response. "There's a Do Not Disturb sign that can stay on the door all damn week if you want."

"You're right, I do have months of crappy sleep to make up for, but you know I did at least get some sleep while I was gone," she says, looking up at him, biting her lip as she vocalises what she wants, _needs_. "I want to go back to bed because there's something else I missed even more than decent sleep..."

"Really?" He smirks at her and runs his thumb so slowly across her bottom lip that she feels a shiver run through her.

"Yep. Come on." She tugs on his hand and starts to move back towards the bedroom, stopping and turning back to him as they reach the door. "It's five in the morning so to avoid any ambiguity here, I'm just going to get right to the point. You, Billy, I missed you."

"I missed that, your directness," he says, pulling the belt of her robe open and sliding his hands inside, his fingers moving across her stomach. "It's really fucking sexy."

"You know what I missed? I missed your hands, your fingers, your mouth, I missed your tongue on my skin..." Shrugging the robe from her shoulders, she leans up and murmurs into his ear, knowing what her words will do and thankful they're just feet from the bed. "I missed feeling you inside me."

*

She crosses her legs, watches Will's eyes skim her thighs as she does, realising he appreciates her being back in a skirt as much as she loves wearing one again. For months a skirt was simply not something that was an option, it wasn't even an item of clothing she had available even if for some reason the occasion had arisen. But today she's back in heels, a skirt, and a silk shirt under her jacket, and she feels like herself again, her work self, and she likes it.

"If he offered something..." He turns to her as the taxi comes to a stop outside the restaurant, pauses as he pulls some cash from his wallet. "What would you think?"

"Do you seriously think that's what this is about? You don't think it's just lunch, or maybe lunch to make sure his prime time anchor isn't about to bail out and hotfoot it back to DC?" she asks, following him out of the car and taking his hand when he offers it. "Maybe he just wants to meet the girlfriend who might tempt you back to the dark side."

"Fiancée," he says, smirking at her. "And I don't know what he has planned, I just know that he isn't stupid, he knows you're a damn good EP, and he knows I was a better anchor when you were my EP."

"If this is you asking if I'd want to be your EP again, then you know the answer," she says, squeezing his hand and smiling at him. "But the offer needs to be right, I'm not willing to produce any old shit, you know that too. He really may just want to meet the woman who made Will McAvoy smile again."

"Maybe." He shakes his head and she suspects he thinks it's more likely Charlie has something specific he wants to discuss, but she's just looking forward to finally meeting the infamous Charlie Skinner, the man who she knows means so much to Will. "Ah, there he is."

"Mackenzie McHale." Charlie grins, putting his glass down and standing up as they approach. "I doubted it was possible, but you look even better in real life."

"Oh, thank you," she says, smiling back and letting go of Will's hand to offer a handshake to Charlie, only to be caught slightly off guard when he hugs her instead, a big, comforting hug that brings an unexpected lump to her throat.

"It's so good to finally meet you," Charlie says, gesturing to the table and waiting for them to sit down. "I thought for a while you were a figment of Will's imagination but then hey presto, you show up in front of the camera. Not only a living, breathing human, but a damn good reporter too."

"Thank you again, and it's nice to meet you too," she says, her smile growing wider as she pushes her hair behind her ear. "I had no doubt you were real."

"My reputation goes before me." Charlie laughs and his gaze lands on her hand, on her ring, his eyes widening before he looks over at Will. "Well, well, look who pulled his head out of his ass in real style! Congratulations!"

"Yeah, well, you know..." Will shrugs, a faint blush colouring his cheeks as he runs a hand through his hair. "Should never have waited this long, so when I knew she was coming home I sure as shit wasn't going to wait any longer."

"That certainly makes what I was going to talk to you both about seem like a better idea," Charlie says, grinning at her, then glancing back at Will. "Although, hang on...does this mean a long distance relationship is on the cards? I mean, you wouldn't be the first couple to spend weekends running between DC and New York, but-"

"We're going to be living here, in New York," she says, opting to be upfront, to see what it is Charlie wants to talk about. "Does that change anything about what you wanted to talk to us about?"

"Direct, I like your style, Ms McHale." Charlie grins again, nodding at her.

"God, it's Mackenzie, please, or Mac." She reaches for the glass of water in front of her and takes a sip, her mouth suddenly dry.

"Alright...Mackenzie," Charlie says, reaching for his glass, definitely not water, taking a gulp and smiling again. "Your fiancé here may or may not have told you that in the last five months he's gone through more EPs than I've gone through socks-"

"Slight exaggeration," Will says, raising his eyebrows as Charlie smirks across the table.

"Very slight." Charlie goes on, looking back at her. "Anyway, I'm going to get right to the point here. Will was at his best when you were his EP, and I liked what the two of you were doing at CNN, I thought it had real potential, so much so that it used to piss me off that they'd gotten hold of you both before ACN did. May I ask what your situation is with CNN? Are you contracted?"

"I was, and then it was amended when I went overseas, from a producer's contract to a reporter's, with various clauses added in," she says, pausing as he frowns faintly. "Anyway, long story short, they basically said they're keen for me to stay with them, I asked for a little time to explore other options, and here I am, exploring other options, I guess."

"So if I were to offer something, you wouldn't rule it out?" Charlie asks, confirming Will's earlier thoughts. "Assuming the thought of spending twenty-four hours a day with McAvoy here doesn't fill you with horror."

"I managed it before, I could probably do it again." She smiles at Charlie and squeezes Will's thigh under the table. "I'm going to go ahead and make the assumption that you have something in mind?"

"And you'd be right," Charlie says with a grin. "Same prime time slot we already have, but we relaunch. Less celebrity gossip and that kind of bullshit, more real news, the kind of news you just witnessed first hand for the last few months. Will as Managing Editor, you as Executive Producer, me stepping right back and giving you carte blanche to make the show your own. Unless you turn it to shit, in which case I'll step the fuck back in. How does that sound?"

"It sounds good to me, but I don't know how Will would cope without his celebrity gossip," she says with a smirk, turning to him.

"It'd be tough, but you know, if it's for the greater good," he says, a smile spreading across his lips.

"I'll draw something up, get it over to you by the end of today." Charlie picks up his glass and raises it before taking a mouthful. "A rough contract, obviously, but it'll include the basics. Terms, money, the important stuff, a starting point for negotiations-"

"I do have a question." She cuts in, knowing whatever is offered will be decent, so prepared to wait for his terms before worrying about negotiating the basics. "How do you feel about having Will's name in the title?"

"Mackenzie McHale, I knew I'd like you." Grinning, Charlie turns to Will. "Anything you want to add?"

"This negotiation seems like it's going pretty well without me," Will says, the smile on his face telling her he's perfectly happy with how it's going.

"I couldn't agree more," Charlie says, turning back to her, smiling. "So, how do you feel about...News Night with Will McAvoy?"

"News Night with Will McAvoy..." She repeats it, envisages it on screen, on billboards, on the sides of buses, his handsome face looking out at her from across the city. She covers Will's hand with her own and smiles back at Charlie. "I love it."


End file.
